Battle of Evermore
by StaroftheDunedain
Summary: The final story in the Rose Winchester Chronicles. Lucifer is free and the Winchesters have to find a way to stop the end of the world and, more importantly, keep their family together.
1. The Sun Also Rises

AN: Welcome to the last story in the Rose Winchester Chronicles!

Disclaimer: Do I really have to do this? Really? Wow. If I owned this, I would not be writing fanfiction. Oh well, I only own Rose and my ideas.

_An 8.7 earthquake the coast of Chine today, killing hundreds. Scientists remain baffled by this recent surge in seismic activity—_

Dean turned off the news, heading into the kitchen to get another whiskey. It had been two weeks since Lucifer had slipped his cage and, between the recent outbreaks of wars and natural disasters, the death toll was steadily rising. No one, not even Robert Singer, had any idea what to do, how to start. How do you beat the devil?

Hell, they had not even figured out how they got from the warehouse to Bobby's.

The Winchesters and Bobby had been holed up in the Singer house, staying up late researching, even translating archaic books into English, desperately searching for anything.

Rose was already in the kitchen when Dean entered, sitting at the table, head bowed over yet another book.

"Hey." It was the first thing Dean had said all day and it was approaching three in the afternoon, his voice hoarse from disuse and from alcohol.

"Hey." She raised bloodshot, exhausted eyes to briefly meet his.

"Wanna drink?" A month ago, he never would have offered his sister anything stronger than a Bud, but if the world was going to end, and Dean was pretty sure that it was going to, then he was not going to deny the girl her first drink.

Her mouth twisted at this sign of his disbelief. "You don't think we can stop it, do you?"

He did not want to answer that, so he just busied himself with uncapping the bottle of Jack. "When was the last time you got some sleep?"

She shrugged. "Don't remember."

"You should get some."

"I don't want to."

"None of us want to. But you'll be no good to us if you pass out."

She snorted. "'Cause we're doing so much good right now."

"Well then, why not live it up?" He raised his glass in a sarcastic toast. "Or, well, sleep it down. Whatever."

"The world is ending, Dean, "she snapped. "Why are you so concerned with my sleeping habits?"

"Because," he snapped back. "Because you're my little sister, and I know you. I know how you act in a crisis. You push yourself, yeah, but you don't go three days without sleep! Not if you can help it. If you were to walk outside to get a book from the car and demons attacked right now, you'd be useless!" He slammed his glass on the counter, whiskey slopping over the side. "Damn it, Rose! I can't, out there…" He gestured vaguely at the door. "I don't know what to do about that. But I can't lose you like this, not right here in front of me."

She raised her eyebrows at his outburst. "Are you trying to have an emotional talk, Dean?"

He crossed his arms, uncrossed, and then recrossed them. "Maybe."

"Who are you, and what have you done with my brother?"

"Oh, shut up, brat." It was said with affection and Rose knew it. "Come on, Rosie, give it up."

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "It's just, I can't. Sleep, I mean. Every time I try to close my eyes, I see…him."

"Lucifer."

She shook her head, sardonic smile on her lips. "No, no. Cas. I see Cas. The look on his face when he sent me away and I just, we, I, I can't." She pulled her feet into her chair and put her face on her knees so that, if she started to cry, her brother would not see. "It hurts, Dean. He died so that I could have a chance at stopping this. And I failed."

"You did the best you could." It was meager comfort, and he knew it. "Which means that it was the best anyone could do."

She made a broken sort of sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob. "What a thing to die for."

Both Winchesters were quiet for a long time while Dean tried to think of a different tactic. Emotional talks were not his forte. Where was emo-boy when you needed him?

Rose was the first to break the silence. "I kissed him." Her voice was so low that Dean had to strain to hear the words.

"What?"

"I kissed him." She looked up at him again. "When he said that it was worth it, dying for my chance, I kissed him." A spark of defiance lit up her eyes, daring Dean to disapprove. "And then he kissed me. Right before he sent me back, he kissed me."

Now Dean was really and truly out of his element. "Uhm…so, did you, do you…" He took a drink out of his glass, a gulp really, too big and he coughed. "I guess you had a crush on him?"

All of the defiance bled out of her and she slumped in her chair, her feet hitting the floor with a dull thud. "I don't know. He was getting ready to die, Dean. Kissing him seemed like the thing to do."

"And looking back?"

She shrugged. "I just, Dean, Cas and I shared part of the same soul. That's kind of a hard connection to deny."

He could not argue with that, so he just took a sip of his drink, wishing the answer was in the bottom of his glass.

"I think that's what's really bothering me. I know he's dead here." She pointed at her head. "And I mourn his death here." She laid her hand over her heart, looking so grown-up and solemn that Dean hurt a little. "But," she continued." I don't feel it. Deeper, down in my core. I mean, what kind of person can have a part of their own soul just _die_ and not feel a damn thing?"

"I don't think that the problem lies with you," came a voice from the corner of the room. "But in the fact that I was not dead very long."

Dean dropped his glass, the sound of it breaking mixing with the sound of Rose scraping her chair back and scrambling to her feet.

"Castiel?" She whispered, eyes huge with disbelief as she stared at her friend, standing there looking a little pale and worn, hair more mussed and clothes more wrinkled than usual, but beautifully alive and just beautiful period. "Is it really? Are you? I don't…"

"It's me." He held his hand out to her.

She felt like she was moving through water as she reached out to take it. When they touched and she felt that familiar scorching but not burning heat, she all but melted against his front. "Have I ever applauded your sense of timing?"

He smiled down at her with the same smile he gave her back in the woods. Then he kissed her.

It was different from their first kisses. Those were full of fear and desperation and good-bye. This one was life affirming, hands bracing instead of clutching, lips moving carefully against one another instead of crushing together, joy seeping through the simple contact.

Dean watched them with mixed reactions. One was a brotherly urge to tear them apart because that was his little sister damn it, a fellow cannot just make out with her in front of him, even if he _is_ an angel. The other was an equally strong older brother's urge to give them some space because she was his sister and damn it the world was ending, didn't she deserve some happiness? The conflicting feelings kept him gawking awkwardly in the kitchen and damn it were they ever going to come up for air?

They were finally interrupted when Sam wandered in from the living room. "Uhm…guys? I think I missed something…."


	2. Back in the Saddle Again

AN: Sorry this took so long. Not one of my best chapters, but it'll get better from here.

Disclaimer: I only own Rose Winchester.

It took them a few minutes to get Castiel onto the couch in the living room-Dean and Sam making sure to sit on either side so that Rose had to sit in a chair next to Bobby across the coffee table from her brothers and the angel.

"How, Cas, what happened?" Rose asked, wanting quite badly to reach over and touch him, reassure herself that he was, in fact, real and alive. Although the warmth lingering on her lips from their kissing was fairly conclusive proof of that. "I mean, I am incredibly, incredibly happy that you are alive, don't get me wrong."

"He knows," Dean mumbled, giving her a glare that made her blush while Sam sniggered quietly.

"But last time I saw you, you were…" she faltered and swallowed hard, catching his eyes and feeling stronger. "You were getting ready to fight I don't know how many angels."

He closed his eyes, clearly heartsick. It made Rose want to hug him. This new _twist_ to an already intense relationship was making her dizzy.

"I don't know how I came back," he said quietly. "But, I fought many of my brothers, more than I thought possible." He spoke with a calm, yet sad acceptance; the way that someone else might talk about a diagnosis of terminal cancer. "I am surprised that I lasted as long as I did."

No one knew what to say to that, so everyone just kind of looked down at the innumerable and questionable stains scattered around Bobby's carpet.

"So, Lucifer," Bobby, who was the best out of all of them at dealing with problems with no solution, "has an army of angels as well as all demons. That's just peachy." He already had a headache just thinking about all of the books he was going to have to read.

"No, that is not accurate," Castiel countered. "The angels aren't siding with Lucifer."

Everyone just sort of looked at him blankly. "I'm confused." Dean leaned down to pick up his drink, then remembered that it was making a puddle on the kitchen linoleum. "I thought the angels were helping to free Lucifer?"

"They were." When everyone still looked confused, Cas sighed. "They don't want Lucifer to win. They want Michael to win."

"Michael?" Sam interrupted. "The archangel?"

"Yes."

"If I remember the story right," Rose was certain she did considering how many times she had read it during the past two weeks. "Then Michael was the one who cast Lucifer out originally, under God's command, when Lucifer rebelled."

"You remember correctly." The look on the angel's face was not the expression of someone telling a story, but of someone reliving a painful memory. "The battle lasted for years, I don't know how much damage was done. Heaven was nearly ripped apart."

"I still don't understand." Sam was not used to not understanding, and he did not like the feeling. "If the angels want Michael to kick Lucifer's ass, then why not leave him in the cage? Wouldn't that be easier?"

"Did you hear nothing that I said?" Castiel stood, feeling frustrated and confined. Confined by his vessel, confined by the building itself. "If it did that much damage to Heaven, the first time they fought, what do you think it will do to Earth?"

"Wipe us out," Rose whispered. They had already been contemplating the apocalypse, but that did not make hearing the way it would happen any easier.

"But, why?" Sam asked. "What did we ever do to them?"

"They're tired," Castiel explained. "Our Father created you, raised you up, gave you free will and you are destroying yourselves. If the end comes, there will be Paradise. My brothers and sisters are ready for it."

"Wow, Cas." Dean's laugh fooled no one. "Sounds like you might have drunk a few glasses of the Kool-Aid."

"I don't understand that reference."

Dean leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees, looking at Cas from his peripheral vision. "Sounds like you agree with the rest of the Holy Rollers."

A hush fell over the group as Castiel tensed up. The lights started to flicker as the angel's hands clenched. "Don't," he positively growled, "Doubt. My. Loyalties." He took a deep breath and the lights resumed their normal yellow glow. "I am repeating what Zachariah told me right before Raphael killed me."

"Raphael?" Dean snorted. "You were wasted by a teenage-mutant-ninja-angel?"

To everyone's surprise the joke, instead of making him angrier, made Castiel chuckle. "I'd like to see you do better against an archangel. I am a Captain, not-" He stopped short. "I was a Captain. I'll be outcast for this."

_Thank you_ seemed a little trite somehow, so no one said it. "Why?" Rose asked quietly. "Why are you on our side?"

"As I told Uriel, I still serve God. Michael and Zachariah are not God. They are overstepping their authority."

"Speaking of the Big Guy." The bitterness dripped from Dean's tone like acidic honey. "Doesn't He care? Why is He just letting all of this happen?"

"I don't know," Castiel admitted. "He left, He had been silent for years before that. The last communication anyone had with Him was…me. 18 years ago."

Everyone, but especially Sam and Rose, were shocked by that. The younger Winchesters had been praying their whole lives, and to hear that no one had been listening, was a blow for which they were not prepared.

"Well, what did He say?" Dean stood and walked over to the liquor cabinet. He ignored his sister's look of mixed disapproval and sadness and poured a glass of bourbon. "Bye kids, see how much you screw up. See you never."

"No." Castiel seemed to miss Dean's mocking tone and took the question with all the seriousness behind it. "I was watching Rose in the hospital nursery and He appeared, told me to look after her." He looked over at Rose. "He told me that she would be important one day."

That made Rose more than slightly uncomfortable. She did not like getting singled-out at birthday parties, much less by God. "Right. Is that the only reason you are still looking out for me?" She honestly did not know what she wanted him to say.

The angel looked over at her with the familiar look of an old lover. "It's the safest reason," he said at last.

Rose got the feeling that he was saving the rest of those reasons for later. She knew right then and there that she never wanted to have that conversation.

"If you two kids could stop making googly eyes at each other," Rose was not sure but she thought she heard a note of affection in Bobby's exasperated tone. "It's the end of the world any way you slice it, and we still don't know what the hell we're doing here." He looked at Cas. "I don't suppose you have any suggestions."

"No, but one thing bothers me about all of this."

"One thing?" Sam snorted. "Really? That's all?"

Castiel completely ignored the younger Winchester man. "Michael. He was not there when I was attacked. I don't know why not, but it seems…out of character. It would have been much easier to kill me himself. As the Leader of the Host, I would not have stood a chance."

The others did not see how that was the most troubling aspect of Castiel's story.

"So…" Sam stood and joined his brother at the liquor cabinet and poured his drink. "We're pretty much screwed. Either the angel war, or Lucifer on his own, is going to nuke us all out of existence. Awesome."

"We can't think like that," Rose said suddenly. "We can't just give up." She shrugged and gave a little, sad laugh. "At least, I wanna go down swinging."

Sam smiled, and Dean raised his glass in her direction. Winchesters were not good at giving up, not really.

"Rose is right," Castiel said. "The chances of us surviving are almost nonexistent, but we have less chance if we do nothing."

Rose laughed. "Thanks." She chuckled again and wiped her eyes. "Oh God, that should not be funny." She glanced over at her brothers; Dean was also smiling and Sam looked like he wanted to.

"You're welcome," he answered perfectly serious.

"Y'all are breaking my heart." Bobby said it sarcastically, but his heart really was cracking.

"I apologize…" Castiel said, clearly unaware of Bobby's tone.

"Yeah, well," Bobby turned to the table and opened a book. "You lot need to get going."

The Winchesters all exchanged puzzled looks. "What?" Sam asked.

"You're not doing any good just sitting around here, are you?" He waved at the door with one hand. "There are things out there need hunting still."

"You want us to forget-"

Dean's question was quelled by a Singer patented you're-an-idjit look. "I'm gonna keep working on it."

"And I will do what I can." Castiel peered over Bobby's shoulder at the book. "I think you mistranslated the Galician passage right there."

"Okay," Dean put down his glass. Sam did the same. "Well, it looks like we have work to do."


	3. By the Pricking of My Thumbs

AN: I feel like I should do a "The Road so far" section. If anyone has any questions, let me know and I will address them.

Disclaimer: The characters other than Rose belong to Kripke. I just own her and she's the least interesting.

A couple of days later, the Winchesters found themselves in Mackinaw, Michigan, hiding from the cops on their way to a local tourist trap that was supposedly haunted. The stories ranged wildly, but the scary man in the green fedora remained consistent. So were the strong EMF readings taken earlier in the day.

It was a big house; built in the Queen Anne Victorian style with two floors, a large attic, and no obvious clues.

"Just once," Rose grumbled as she pulled a flashlight out of her coat pocket. "Just once I wish there'd be a sign saying 'Identity of Ghost Here'."

"Where would the fun be in that?" Dean teased, handing her a sawed-off. She just rolled her eyes and took the gun, cramming some spare shells in yet another pocket. She had bought her sheepskin-lined denim jacket for a few reasons; it did not tear easily, allowed for flexible movement yet did not snag, and was very warm. Also, it had a lot of pockets.

"Okay," Dean said, while Sam diffused the alarm and Rose picked the lock. "I call dibs on the main floor."

Rose pulled a quarter from her pants' pocket. "Flip you for the second floor."

"Tails."

Which is how it landed. "Darn it," she complained, slapping Sam's arm when he sniggered. "Two out of three?"

"No way. You get the attic."

"I hate the attic," she mumbled, mostly to herself. "They're cobwebby and full of crap and spiders." She shivered. "I hate spiders."

It took her three tries to wrench open the door and then five minutes to stop coughing at the dust. "I. Hate. Attics."

The first things she noticed were five old steamer trunks. That was as good a place as any to start looking for clues to the identity of a ghost. She pulled out several old tintype photographs of multiple subjects, all of whom had their eyes closed.

A couple of hundred years ago, it was a common practice to take portraits of people before their death. Rose realized that she was looking at just such a collection of photographs. "Ew."

She heard footsteps on the stairs. She would know either Dean or Sam anywhere. Knew Sam's sort of shuffle he did unless he was actually fighting, knew the sound of Dean's sure movements, knew the time it took for each foot to fall. "Coming to check on me already?"

This was not either of them.

She tightened her grip on her gun and spun around, flashlight trained to the door.

A middle-aged, plump, bald, white guy with a very smug expression came through it. "That gun won't do you any good."

She shot anyway. All it did was ruffle the man's suit.

"I told you."

"But now my brothers know I need help."

"Oh, good." The stranger was pulling a dusty chair out of the corner, suddenly clean, and sat down. "Let's wait for them, then."

"What are you?"

"My name is Zachariah."

Rose recognized the name, and anger flared hot in her stomach. "You killed Cas."

"Technically, that was Raphael."

Footsteps pounded up the stairs. Sam, with Dean hot on his heels, burst through the door, guns leveled. "Rose?" They spotted the angel.

"Who the hell are you?" Dean asked, stepping in front of Sam, trying to edge his way toward Rose.

"Zachariah." The angel smiled at the men's expressions. "Yes, yes, I helped kill Castiel. No point in getting your panties in a twist over it now."

"Then, how about the fact that you let the devil out of the box?" Dean wanted to shoot so badly that his trigger finger started to ache. "Are we supposed to just get over that too? All the people who are going to die?"

Zachariah shrugged. "Yeah, well, you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs." He laughed at his own joke. "Or, in this case, truckloads of eggs."

"Sorry if we don't share your flippant,-" Rose and Dean shared an ill-timed, amused look at Sam's vocabulary "-attitude toward human life."

"Actually, we don't care about you anymore." Zachariah waved his hand towards the door. "You can go, at least for now. You've played your part." He gave Rose a smug, condescending look. "And, honestly, I don't know why we bothered you or why you were even born. Doesn't matter either way I suppose." He clapped his hands together and turned all of his attention to Dean. "No, you're the one we need."

"What're you talking about?"

Zachariah snapped his fingers and a large painting appeared in his hands, complete with gilded framing. It depicted a long haired man in shining armor with a scale and a sword stabbing a red devil-like creature with horns and a pitchfork.

"The real thing will be much bloodier of course," he commented, giving the frame a fond pat. "But you get the gist." The painting disappeared. "To win this war, to stop Lucifer, Michael needs his sword." He pointed at the oldest Winchester.

"Me?" Dean took a step back. "I'm a…vessel?"

"No, you're THE vessel," Zachariah contested. "You're the only one Michael can use to fight."

"Why me?"

The angel shrugged. "There are a number of reasons why it could have been you. But then, you broke the first seal, Dean. Alastair wasn't lying. You started this whole thing."

Dean made a choking sound. Rose stepped closer to him and laid her hand on his shoulder while Sam tightened his grip on his gun and considered shooting the angel.

Zachariah closed his eyes. "It is written, _As the righteous man breaks the first seal, so shall he end it_." He opened his eyes and gave Dean a bright smile, showing a few too many teeth, like someone who had once seen a picture of a grin and was trying to mimic it from memory. "It's your destiny to stop Lucifer."

"Maybe it is," Dean said, swallowing hard around the lump in throat. "I don't know. But you can take your plan, your war, and shove it up your lily-white ass." He kept a straight face at Zachariah's disbelieving expression.

"What, exactly, is so worth saving?" The angel asked. "I look at this world and I see pain, suffering, cruelty, and despair. When we win, and we will win because you and your tiny miserable life won't be able to stop us, everything will be peaceful."

"I guess I should take my 'tiny, miserable life' and do whatever the hell I want." Dean did not expect to get the last word in an argument with an angel. But he was also not expecting Castiel to come and yank him into hyperdrive.

He arrived/teleported/landed next to Sam and Rose in what looked like a park with a playground and benches.

Dean looked around at the normalcy of his surroundings and groaned. "I need a drink."


	4. Eminence Front

AN: Hey y'all! Sorry this took so long to update. For any of you who are interested (and a few of you have actually gone and reviewed) but I have a story Sweet Child of Mine that, so far, is two Roseverse oneshots.

Disclaimer: I only own Rose

The first thing Castiel did was reach out and touch Rose; on her ribcage, fingers fanning out warm through her thin t-shirt. Pain flared out from the spot, like fire in her bones. "Ow!"

He ignored her and did the same to her brothers. Ignoring their cursing as well, he blinked and suddenly, they were all outside a bar.

"What the hell, Cas?" Dean demanded, still rubbing his side, even though the pain was nothing more than a memory ache.

"Enochian sigils," the angel explained. "I carved them onto your ribs. Now you're hidden from all angels."

The _including me_ went unspoken, but Rose could feel it in her gut.

"I suppose that was a good idea," Sam admitted grudgingly, stretching, trying to get rid of the residual sting.

"I know," Cas replied matter-of-factly. "What did Zachariah want with you?"

"Maybe we should talk about this somewhere a little less conspicuous," Rose suggested, hiding a bit of a smile.

It was getting late, but the joint was still busy. There was a pool game going in one corner and a couple of hookers at the bar. The music was loud, the lights dim, and the beer bad.

"Why did you bring us here?" Rose asked, while she, Cas and Sam secured a table. (Dean had vanished to get drinks).

"Dean was thinking of it," Cas said, looking very uncomfortable as he sat awkwardly at the edge of a chair next to Rose. "This is a den of iniquity," he hissed. "I shouldn't be here."

"Dude, you full-on rebelled against Heaven," Dean said, putting a shot glass in front of everyone except Rose and a bottle of Jack in the center of the table. To his sister, he gave a bottle of beer. "Iniquity is one of the perks."

Rose had to swallow a shared smile with Sam at the face Castiel made when he took a sip from his glass. Leave it to Dean to come up with something to smile over in the middle of the apocalypse. She lost her smile, however, when Dean knocked back his whiskey like it was water and he was a dying man.

She started to say something, but Sam caught her eye. _Not now,_ he mouthed, glancing at the bottle. He understood where Rose was coming from, but now was not the time to be getting on to Dean about his drinking habits. This conversation was going to be bad enough.

"Back on topic…" Sam said, leaning toward the angel. "Zachariah said that, Dean is Michael's vessel, that he is the one who can stop it." He gave his brother a look from the corner of his eye. "Because he started it."

Dean looked at the bottle and then at his empty glass with a longing expression.

Castiel nodded and looked down at his own glass. "It makes sense. It's poetic even."

"Poetic?" Dean repeated. "I'm supposed to help wipe-out humanity and you're treating it like it's a freaking limerick."

"Dean." Castiel's voice got even lower than usual. "I fully understand the gravity of this situation, perhaps more so than you, considering that this is the second time I have fought Lucifer."

Dean did not really have an answer to that, so he poured a second shot.

Castiel's voice returned to its usual timbre. "This is actually a good thing."

"How exactly is Michael wanting to ride my ass a good thing?"

The angel refrained from rolling his eyes, but it was obviously a near thing. Rose was not sure if her family had been a good influence or not.

"Because Michael needs a vessel, an earthly tether. Without one, he cannot fight."

"What's to stop him from just hopping into someone else?" Sam asked. "I mean, I get the whole…poetry thing." He gave Dean a slightly abashed look at the term, but pressed onward. "But it doesn't actually have to be Dean. Does it?"

Castiel nodded. "Most likely." He finished his shot, then took a long swig right from the bottle, looking from it to Dean like he did not quite get the point. "It is not like a demon possession; there are…rules."

"What kinda rules?" Rose started to take a sip of her beer , but pushed away the bottle.

"Not every human can be a vessel," he answered. "The names of the vessels are written down long before their birth. It's destiny. And not every human fits every angel." He looked down at his hands, opening and closing them a few times almost experimentally. "There is always a connection between the two."

Rose shifted a little in her chair, feeling guilty all of a sudden. She had never once thought about the person in there _with_ Cas, never even wondered how he might feel, if he knew what was going on. If he had been to Hell as well.

Cas looked back up at Dean, leaned across the table with an intent, laser-like focus on the man's face. "But, most importantly, the vessel MUST. Say. Yes."

"So, Michael is stuck up there?"

Cas leaned back and shrugged, stiffly, like he was not sure he was doing it correctly. "He is an archangel. He will be able to find another, temporary, vessel, but he will be restricted by its limitations. He might be able to come to Earth, but he will be far from his full strength.

"And he won't be able to take on Lucifer," Sam said, remembering what Castiel had said earlier. The whole group was silent for a few moments, until Sam had an epiphany. "Hang on, Lucifer was an angel, right?"

Castiel nodded, head cocked to the side in a gesture that reminded Rose of a curious puppy.

"Does he have the same rules regarding vessels?"

Castiel looked at Sam like he was surprised that it had taken him so long to make that leap. Sam tried not to be insulted.

"Yes. Why else do you think the devastation has not been fully unleashed?"

"So, he's got to do all of this vessel shopping that Michael can do?" Dean clarified.

"Yes."

"Well," Dean poured a third glass of whiskey. "Here's to hoping that they don't have a midnight sale on vessels at Target."

He knocked it back, and Rose sighed. "How many of those are you gonna have tonight?"

"As many as I damn well feel like it."

"Let's go," Sam said, sensing a storm about to break between his siblings. "Do you mind taking us back to the Impala, Cas?"

Castiel looked from Rose to Dean and nodded slowly. He might be obtuse in some areas, but the guy could sense emotion like nobody's business. In less than the blink of an eye, they were all by the car.

"Hope nobody was looking," Dean grumbled, unlocking the door.

"No one was." In another blink, he was gone.

When Rose clambered into the backseat without arguing and Dean actually slammed the door of his baby, Sam took a deep breath and hoped he would survive the fallout.


	5. Lean on Me

AN: In the show, we have wonderful hunts and such in the middle of all of the action. That would take a bit too long, so we have a couple of personal chapters as a break from angels and demons… At least, that is the plan. Thanks to my wonderful beta Lynn

Sam was a little surprised that the storm waited until they got to the hotel room, but he was glad. Getting in a fight in that small a space was not a good idea. He knew that from experience.

They drove for nearly thirty minutes before coming to a little motel two towns away from their meeting with Zachariah. The motel was originally called the Troubadour but enough letters were out on the sign that it said T_he Rad Motel_.

Dean went into the office in order to procure a room, and Sam and Rose waited outside. Sam looked up at the sky and saw clouds rolling dark and heavy across the room, like a literal storm was about to break as well.

"Look, Rose, I think I know why you're upset, and I get it," he said. "But it's not like it's been easy for him."

Rose chuckled darkly. "It's been Hell."

Sam blew out a puff of air. "I just mean—"

"I know what you mean, Sam." She gave him a small smile, tired at the corners.

"Okay." There was not really anything to say to that, so Sam just pushed his hands further into his pockets and slouched against the hood of the car.

Dean came back from the office and opened the trunk, ignoring his siblings. He did not need to say anything. Sam could tell from his jerky, tense movements just how taut his nerves were stretched. In contrast, Rose was walking with more purpose in her step than usual, more like a woman and less like a child.

Dean threw his bags on the bed closest to the door and whirled to face his sister. "What the hell is your problem?"

Sam shut the door behind the trio with a quiet click, completely drowned out by Dean's voice.

Rose, quite calmly, put her own duffle on the sofa so small that it made Sam's legs ache to look at it. "How much have you had to drink today?"

"Not enough."

"Too much."

As if on cue, thunder boomed outside loud enough to rattle the windows. Sam, who had not made it much past the door, flinched. No one else moved.

"It's the end of the world, Rose," Dean said, his voice even in the way that meant he was trying very hard to control his temper. "I-"

"And a fat load of good you're going to do if you keep your head in whisky glass," she interrupted, rocking back on her heels slightly, tone eerily similar to her brother's.

"I can still do my job," Dean hissed out through slightly clenched teeth.

"So could Dad," Rose countered coldly.

That clearly threw Dean for a loop. "What's Dad got to do with this?"

Sam had a sinking feeling as to where exactly Rose was going with this. He agreed entirely, but there was no faster way to make Dean explode.

"Dad was a coward," Rose said plainly.

If Sam had said it, he would have been ducking punches. But Dean had never hit Rose, and it was not as ingrained a reaction. Still, his fists clenched dangerously. "Our Dad was a lot of things, Rose, but never a coward."

Rose glanced down at Dean's fists and crossed her arms. "You can hit me if you want to, Dean. I've been hit by stuff stronger than you. Doesn't matter. I'm still going to say what I need to."

Dean took a step closer. Sam took a step closer to him, but stopped when Rose gave him a warning look over Dean's shoulders. Other than that, she stayed motionless. "He crawled into a bottle to avoid everything he was afraid to face: losing Mom, how he was raising us, the things he saw. Hell Dean, when I was a kid, the only times I saw Dad he was either bloody or drunk. Or both." She took a step closer to the line of fire. "I know what you're going through, Dean, I do. I was in Hell too."

"You didn't break any seals."

"No, but I was the one who was given the responsibility of stopping you!" That startled both her brothers into stillness and silence. She smiled grimly at their shocked reactions. "So, believe me when I say, I get it." She took a deep breath and let it out very slowly. "And believe me when I say that Sam and I are not going to let you turn into Dad."

All of the tension sort of bled out of Dean, replaced by tiredness. From the back, his shoulders slumped like an old man's.

"That could be harder than you think."

"Not really." She walked over to Dean's bag and pulled out the Black Label from underneath the dirty t-shirts. "You've been a better man than Dad since you were ten-years-old, Dean." She handed him the drink and then walked over to the couch. She went about the business of setting out the things she needed to clean her gun.

Sam set up his laptop, but watched Dean over the edge. He sat on his bed, turning the bottle over and over in his hands, reading and re-reading the label. After a long period of time, bottle held loosely by the neck, Dean walked into the bathroom.

His siblings heard the gurgling, sloshing sound of liquid being poured down the drain.

"Good call," Sam said quietly.

She shrugged. "He didn't want to hurt us."

Sam had to concede the point.

When Dean came out of the bathroom, Rose smiled at him. "I'm gonna go get a soda. Want one?"

"No," he said sourly.

"Mountain Dew then. Sam?"

"Water."

"Healthfreak."

"Take a gun," Dean said, flopping onto his bed and grabbing the remote.

"I know, Deano." She rolled her eyes and tucked the gun into her waistband, letting her overshirt cover it completely.

The rain had stopped, and the asphalt smelled like gasoline and clean freshness, the mixture exceedingly familiar to Rose with her life on the road. She took a deep breath and leant against the soda machine, listening to the rumble. She also heard a familiar rustle of wingbeats.

"Hey, Cas."

AN2: I wrote this chapter mostly because I wanted some sort of intervention for Dean in season 5. He drinks a lot in that one.


	6. My City of Ruins

AN: I promise, important things are afoot. I just needed to give the Winchesters a bit of a breather. Also, thanks to my creative consultant, JustWhelmed. She will tell you that I stressed about this chapter a ridiculous amount. Reviews please

Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

"Hello," Castiel said, not questioning how she knew it was him. "Are you alright? I could tell you were upset."

"I'm fine, just, uh, got into it with Dean a little earlier. But, I think it's gonna be okay." She fed a bill into the machine. "How did you know where to find me?" She tapped the top of the can to keep the fizz down. "I thought I was hidden from you guys."

"Your brothers are hidden from me. You are hidden from all _but_ me."

"Hm, that's a little comforting actually…in a should-be creepy way." She smiled and pointed a finger at him. "You should be glad you're an angel." She turned around and leant against the machine. "Different sigils carved on my ribs?"

"No." Any other person would lean or shift his weight, but Castiel stood there still. "Humans are not aware of their souls. But angels, our souls, our Grace, is a like a limb, but more important. We feel its los and location keenly. Some part of me is always seeking you out—that same part can tell if you are extremely upset or frightened."

"Or happy?" she asked, mostly out of curiosity.

"Extremely happy, yes." The line of his mouth softened. "That does not happen often."

"Not lately anyway." She took a long sip from her cola, realized that he was looking at her more intently than usual."What?"

He reached out and tucked a wayward strand of hair back behind her ear.

Raised in a family of undemonstrative men, Rose was unused to tender gestures and blushed until her ears matched her name.

She was not sure who initiated the kiss, but she found herself locking lips with the angel. Which was apparently addictive.

Castiel's hands came to rest on her hips, his fingertips just brushing her gun. She realized that she was still holding her can of soda. It was a little awkward.

"Uhm, Cas," she said, pulling away a little. "I should, uhm, put this down."

He gave her a look like he was imparting great wisdom. "Buy another," he said very seriously. Then he kissed her again.

She surrendered and dropped the can, tangling her hands in his hair. He made a low sound deep in his throat and pressed her back against the machine, one hand sliding up to rest on her ribcage.

A sudden cough, very loud and obviously fake, made them break apart.

"I came out to see if you needed help." Sam was grinning like a loon. "Clearly you…have the situation well _in hand_."

Rose feebly pushed at Castiel's chest. He gave Sam an almost annoyed look and took a pointed step back.

Rose blushed to the roots of her hair. "Don't you have something else to be doing? Like jumping off a cliff?"

Sam laughed. "Just, if you want the keys to the Impala, you get to be the one to tell him why."

Rose kicked her discarded can at her older brother, lemon-lime soda almost hitting his jeans.

When he was out of sight, Rose groaned and turned back to Castiel, who actually looked amused.

"What's so funny?" she groused, still pink.

"I am just glad it was not Dean," he said. "I am getting tired of repairing this coat."

Rose laughed, mostly because it was Castiel's first real attempt at making a joke (she thought). "Yeah, Sam is a little less psycho than Dean."

"Dean has always been very protective of you," the angel agreed. "When you were born, he insisted that your parents put a monitor in his room, just in case."

"Really? I never knew that. Wait…" the ramifications of what he had just said fully hit her. "Huh." She shook her head. "Wow. You really have been there the whole time."

"Yes."

"I mean, I knew that, but, you know, it's still a little weird." She smiled. "Sometimes, it's hard to wrap my head around the fact that I've had a guardian angel for my entire life. Then, sometimes, it's hard to wrap my head around the fact that I never realized you were there."

A smile flitted across his features. "You almost did a few times."

She frowned, nose scrunching up a little in confusion. She took a deep breath, trying to remember. When she inhaled, she caught a whiff of evergreen in snow.

"OH!" she exclaimed. "In Jericho, when we were hunting that woman-in-white. I fell off the bridge. Dean and Sam seemed to think I had drowned."

"You would have," the angel replied.

"Oh, well, thanks, I guess." She turned around and fed another bill into the machine, mostly so she would not have to look at him when she started on her next topic. "If you've been…looking out for me, for my whole life. When did you, uhm, start wanting to…push me up against a soda machine and have your way with me?"

She sneaked a peek at him from the corner of her eye. He was frowning thoughtfully. "That's a little difficult to explain, but I will attempt."

The cola had long since dropped into the slot, but Rose did not turn around.

"I thought your soul was beautiful when I first saw it, and I cared about you. But, my feelings were tied in with my duty; you were a chosen creature of My Father and you were my responsibility."

He must have stepped closer, because his hand came to rest between her shoulder blades. "Since you were born, you've been on the fringe of my consciousness. When you were in Hell, I lost you." His warmth seeped into her skin. His voice was particularly low. "And I realized, Rose, that I need you. When I don't know what is going on, you give me a reason."

"Stop," she said quietly. "I can't."

"No." She could not see his face, but his voice was stern. "You started this. But I need this too."

"Even when I pulled you from Hell, it was not like this. But, actually talking to you, and your brothers, I've found that there are things about humanity-feelings and beliefs—that I now share." He slid his hand down to her hip in a gesture both sensual and romantic. "You brought me down to this, Rose. I fell for you, because of you. I am hunted and an outcast. And I am grateful."

She put her forehead against the machine, tears welling up in her eyes. "Maybe you shouldn't." She let out a shaky breath, watching it fog up the plastic. "Castiel, I am not a brave person, not really. I can't care about that many people. I've already let you in as much as I can." She wanted to turn around, look at him, but knew that she would cave if she did. "It hurt enough when I thought you died and it's the end of the world, and, just…don't ask me for anything else. Please. Not with things the way they are now."

Since she could not see his face, she could only guess as to his emotions. Hurt? Angry? He drew closer; she could feel him press against her back, arms sliding around her middle for an instant before he vanished.

She left the soda in the machine and, wishing her heart could just be swallowed by a black hole because that would make things easier, trudged back to the room.

"Where's my Mountain Dew?" Dean asked.

She ignored him, rummaging through her bag, before slamming the bathroom door. She turned the knob in the shower until the water was scalding hot, and scrubbed until her skin was raw, letting her tears fall down in the spray.

She stayed until the water eventually got so cold that it made her shiver and her skin was so pruned that it ached. Slowly, she dried off and put on a pair of Dean's old sweats, cast-off and cut-off ten years before and a t-shirt that pretty much ate her. When she came out, Dean was already in bed asleep, and Sam was set up on the couch with his laptop.

Since he had claimed her usual spot, Rose padded across the room almost silently and slid into the second bed.

"You okay?" Sam asked after a few minutes. She pretended to have fallen asleep in absolutely record time.

She heard Sam get up, footsteps, then felt the bed dip. Sam put his back against the headboard and continued typing. It was not quite a lullaby, but it would do.

AN2: I realized that I haven't used nearly enough Bruce Springsteen titles…. This must be fixed.

AN3: I am compiling a playlist of Cas/Rose songs for inspiration. If any of you have any ideas… Let me know in your reviews Thanks!


	7. The Stuff the Dreams are Made of

AN: *runs away and hides*

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

It was a week before anything else happened on the Lucifer front. A week of hunting two ghosts and a werewolf. A week of a strange _shift_ in Dean's attitude towards Rose. At least, that was how it seemed to Sam. The middle Winchester watched in shock when Dean, instead of turning to Sam when he got too tired to drive, offered the keys to Rose. She looked as surprised as Sam felt, but smiled and said nothing, even leaving in Dean's Zeppelin tape.

It was as if Rose's outburst had done for Dean what her going to Hell had done for Sam; made him face the fact that she was growing up.

The Winchesters finally fell asleep near dawn, dirt and werewolf blood circling down the drain. Dean had passed out, having gotten redressed after his shower-even putting on boots-just in case something happened, on his usual bed nearest the door. On, not in; he had not even bothered to pull up the covers. Rose had barely done any better, taking the time to change into one of Sam's old t-shirts and a pair of sweatpants cut off mid-thigh, then climbing beneath the covers of a rollaway bed. She forgot to get a pillow off of one of the two main beds.

Sam was left to double check the salt lines and the locks. He placed Dean's leather jacket over him and carefully slid a pillow under Rose's head, smiling softly at the snuffling noise she made. He slid between his own sheets and joined his siblings in dreamland.

Literally.

Dean was sitting in a plush chair, the only audience member in a room with a stage on the floor and pornographic illustrations on the wall. Warrant's Cherry Pie was blaring from unseen speakers. On the stage, a blonde wearing skimpy, white lingerie and fluffy angel wings was dancing seductively with a brunette wearing skimpy red lingerie and devil horns.

"This is what I call peace on Earth," Dean said, leaning forward to get a better look.

It looked like the lingerie was about to come off when Rose appeared to the left of the stage. Nothing killed the mood like a little sister in the Scooby-Doo pajamas she used to wear when she was five.

"Uhm," Dean articulated, giving the strippers a guilty look.

"Seriously, Dean," she said, as unfazed as it was possible to be then writhing strippers were trying to give her brother a lap dance. "Are you confusing reality and porn again?"

"What are you doing in my dream?" He finally managed to ask. The strippers finally disappeared. He was both relieved and irritated. "Is this some new, Jedi mind-power of yours?"

"I was dreaming about fishing," Rose retorted, padding over barefoot to sit in the chair next to Dean.

He snorted. "Since when do you fish?"

"Dreaming"

"Whoa," Sam said from behind them. He took a seat next to Rose and started using his teeth to undo the Velcro of his boxing gloves.

"Am I the only person seriously disconcerted by this?" Rose asked, looking at the bruise forming over Sam's left eye.

"One of us is just having a very weird, lifelike, incredibly vivid dream." Dean was trying to be reassuring, but the result was that he had talked himself out of believing it.

Just then, a good-looking man in his early twenties with dirty blonde hair, brown eyes and a Marine's dress uniform walked through a door that had appeared in the middle of nowhere.

"He one of yours?" Dean asked, nudging his sister.

"No." _I was dreaming about my-Castiel. And fishing. _

"Yours then, Sammy?" He teased his brother. "I knew it."

Sam hit him hard on the shoulder. Apparently the dreaming boxing practice was helping because it hurt.

The Marine smiled. "I can see why Castiel likes you; you're funny."

"Who are you?" The laughter in Dean's voice was gone, replaced by suspicion.

"I'm an angel," the Marine answered. "Sorry about all of this, but this is the only way I can talk to you."

All three Winchesters had tensed when he announced his identity. "We don't have anything to say to you," Dean gritted through clenched teeth.

"Then just listen." The angel pulled up a chair that had appeared as suddenly as the door. "First off, I wanted to apologize. Zachariah and Uriel completely overstepped their authority."

Dean snorted. "Yeah, maybe you should have made it clear in the company bylaws. Starting the Apocalypse is absolutely not okay. Maybe send out a memo or two-"

"Dean," the angel sounded tired, like a parent telling something to a stubborn child. "For once in your life, shut up and listen."

"You're Michael, aren't you?" Sam asked quietly, something like awe in his voice. "The archangel, patron saint of soldiers."

Michael smiled. "They told me that you were the smart one. Yes, I am Michael."

"Okay, we're done here." Dean stood; Rose was not sure where he thought he was going to go considering this was all in a dream anyway.

"Dean." Michael's voice got very low, lower than Castiel's. It reverberated around the room, making every chair but his own quiver. "Sit your ass down." He made a jerking motion with his hand and Dean's butt hit the floor. He looked more stunned than hurt.

Michael nodded in satisfaction. "That's better." He leant forward in his chair, eyes beseeching, intense in that way that set Castiel apart from normal humans. "I will admit to making mistakes. Uriel has fought with me many times over many centuries. We were brothers. I would have died for him; I thought…" He trailed off, and his smile was tired. "That doesn't matter now. Believe me, though, I never wanted Lucifer free."

"Way to drop the ball on that one," Dean mumbled.

Lightning flashed across the archangel's face and the Winchesters all tensed, expecting some heavenly wrath. But Michael took a deep breath and the anger gave way to a rueful grin. "I know. And now I need your help to fix it. Zachariah may have been misguided-and he has been punished, severely, for what he has done-but he was correct in one regard. You are my true vessel, Dean. Only with you can I defeat Lucifer.

"And destroy the world to do it," Dean retorted. "Sounds like you want everybody to pay for your mistake. Oh, wait, let me guess, you just see guilt, pain, and suffering." He repeated off Zachariah's list and pretended not to be scared when the archangel stood.

"Don't you dare claim to know what I feel or see," His voice carried more power than anything Rose had ever felt, rattling windows and knocking the kama sutra illustrations off of the walls. "I am the leader of the Heavenly Host. I have been protecting mankind since its creation against creatures you have not imagined in your darkest nightmares. I weigh souls in judgment, hear the pleading and the crying. I—"

He stopped himself and seemed to deflate back down to normal. "I don't want to fight my little brother, Dean." (It was startling to hear Lucifer referred to in that soft of a tone) "But I cannot let him win. Trust me, it will be worse for humanity than getting caught in the crossfire."

Michael resumed his seat. It was strange how none of the angels slouched. He looked at Dean, something hard around his eyes, something old and tired. Even though she was afraid of him, Rose felt sorry for him. She was beginning to see similarities between the archangel and her oldest brother.

"Tell, me, Dean, as you rush in so quickly to condemn me." Dean had the grace to look a little abashed. "What else would you have me do?"

There was a long pause while Dean bit his lip. "I don't know," he finally admitted. "But I have to look for other options."

"I pray you find it." Michael's mouth twisted into something harsh. "But I haven't had a prayer answered in a long time. I cannot wait around for you to decide what to do."

Rose and Sam both leaned protectively toward their brother. "What are you going to do?" Sam asked.

Michael noticed Sam and Rose's posture and smiled. "I'm not going to force Dean into accepting. It has to be his choice entirely. But I can show you…" He made eye contact with all of the Winchesters. "Dark things are already happening; you need to understand—You. Don't. Have. Time. To look for more options. I can prove it."

Abruptly, Dean and Sam woke up, hearts racing in their ears. Over the drumming of their pulses, they could hear whimpering. They rolled over simultaneously to see their sister still asleep. Her brow furrowed, small, pained noises escaping from her throat.

Dean dropped to the floor and tried to shake her awake. "Michael let her go, you bastard!"

He had to duck to avoid her hand as she sat bolt upright. "Are you okay?"

"No, no I'm not." She swung out of bed and rummaged through her bag. "I need, we gotta call Bobby or Cas or…somebody."

Sam approached her slowly, putting his hands on her shoulders and turning her around. "What is going on?"

"I don't know." She shook her head, eyes a little wild. "But it's bad. People are going to die."

AN2: I thought that Michael should not be a douche. So… He isn't in my story. lol


	8. The Assyrians Swept Down On the Fold

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

AN: Thanks y'all for all of your support so far! I hope I am making this enjoyable.

Rose was still trying to gather her scattered thoughts together enough to communicate what she had seen, when there came a knock on the door. Dean looked over at his siblings—Rose on her cot, knees pulled up to her chest and Sam sitting next to her, his size making the cot look like a child's crib—and drew his gun.

He looked through the peephole and almost sighed with relief. He was not sure why Cas was _outside_ the motel instead of just whooshing inside, but he opened the door to the angel anyway.

"Rose had a vision," he said by way of explanation, relocking the door. Dean noticed that Sam tensed even further at Castiel's presence and the uncertain way that Cas moved across the room to stand by Rose. Dean got the feeling that he was missing something, but even he knew that now was not the right time to ask.

Rose, however, did not even look at Cas. She just reached out blindly and grabbed his hand, squeezing so hard that her knuckles turned white. The angel, completely unfazed by Rose's death grip, knelt in a position that made Dean's muscles cramp just looking.

He laid the hand not being desperately clutched on her forehead. "Breathe, Rose, that's it. Can you feel me?" She nodded. "Concentrate on me. Breathe."

Her eyes fluttered open, and she held his hand more loosely. "I'm okay." She was still pale, but that was due to what she had seen, not the physical effects of the vision. "Michael packs quite a wallop."

She cleared her throat. "Tuscan, Arizona, there were these people, teenagers. They were hanging out in a coffee shop, I think. All of a sudden, this dark haired boy, sixteen at the oldest; he just, jumped out of his chair and attacked the blonde guy sitting across the table. Just slammed his face down on the table, again and again until the, his face was all mashed in, bits of his nose sticking through the skin." She shuddered. "The dark haired guy just left him shaking on the floor. Someone in the back yelled 'FIGHT' like kids at school."

She took a deep breath, feeling weak and trying not to show it. "It all spilled outside. People came out with guns, knives, even pieces of broken furniture as clubs. They were all teens to start with, but then the parents came out, police, and everything just got worse. Blood was running everywhere, in the rain gutters. People lying on the ground, barely alive and…trying to scratch each others' eyes out."

It was surreal for Rose to be looking her brothers and not at destruction. It was always hard to come back to reality from a vision.

They were staying at a 60s theme motel, complete with orange shag carpet and a black velvet portrait of Elvis. Rose had seen a hundred in her life, but she could not help but stare at this one. It was so juxtaposed to the images of carnage still swirling in her brain.

Dean suppressed the urge to shiver. "Are we talking mass possession?"

Cas shook his head. "I've seen mass possession. A couple of centuries ago in Salem for one. I'm not sure what this is…"

"You said, 'Tuscan' right?" Sam asked, going over to the table and booting up his laptop.

"Yeah."

"Something weird happened there three days ago. I saw the headline yesterday. It didn't seem like our kind of thing at the time, but…" He smiled when he found the article. "There was a shooting star over the city…" There came the sound of frantic typing. "Huh. Apparently, there has been a spike in hospitalizations since then. Not a huge amount, but some." He looked around at the group. "You think that means anything?"

"Yes," Cas answered. "**And there fell a great star from Heaven, burning like a torch, and it fell upon a river and the star's name was Wormwood. And many men died."**

Sam picked his Bible from where he had been doing research. "Revelation 8:10. It's an omen."

"Omen of what?" Dean asked.

"The End of Days, War."

"We have Wars all the time, this is different," Dean argued.

"Not war the action, War the Horseman," Sam countered, clutching his Bible, hands feeling shaky.

Dean knew that it was pointless to question an angel, but he asked anyway. "Are you sure?"

"All of the prophecies ever made are engraved upon my brain," Cas said quietly.

"Uhm," Rose interjected, "War rides the red horse, right?"

"Yes."

"There was a cherry Mustang parked outside the coffee shop," she remembered.

"Are you kidding me?" Sam huffed, almost laughing.

Dean shrugged. "It's how I'd roll,"

"What are we going to do?" Rose asked everyone present.

It was Dean who answered. "Cas, can you kill a horseman?"

Castiel looked down at his hands, flexing them and turning them over, almost as if he were testing their strength. "I don't know," he admitted finally. "The Horsemen are not like demons, and I am cut off from the strength of Heaven." A long dagger slid from his sleeve into his hand. It looked ancient, silver, with strange letters carved into the blade. "But I just need to cut off the ring." He twisted the dagger up in a fluid, practiced motion. "I think I can."

Dean nodded and looked back at his sister. "How long do we have?"

She closed her eyes and cast her mind back amongst the memories. Rose did not have a perfectly photographic memory, but being a Hunter meant that details could save your life and so it was very close. "There was a woman reading a newspaper two tables over; it had a date. Tomorrow's date. We only have until tomorrow."

Castiel reached out his hand to touch them, but Dean stepped back. "You zap me somewhere, and I don't poop for a week." He snagged his keys from the nightstand. "We have time. I'm driving."

After years of practice, the Winchesters could evacuate a motel room in under 10 minutes, leaving behind only the faint smell of gunpowder and motor oil.

AN2: "The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold" is a line from a Byron poem.


	9. The Rider Lay Distorted and Pale

AN: One non-network acceptable bad word because, to sort of quote JustWhelmed, sometimes all you can say is f***.

Rose had forgotten how _hot_ it got in Arizona in summer. The Impala had a crap air conditioning to boot (although she loved her life more than to mention that to Dean), so it was only the air coming in from the open windows that provided any relief. Unfortunately, the air coming in was hot as well, so they all found themselves sticking uncomfortably to the leather upholstery.

It was not Hell, but it was an uncomfortable reminder. She knew that the same train of thought had to be running through Dean's mind. She glanced at him, found him looking at her. They were having flashbacks of Hell while on their way to stop the Red Horseman. The morbid absurdity of their lives struck them simultaneously and they both burst into laughter.

Rose used the rearview to glance at the backseat, and the identical confused expressions on the faces of Sam and Castiel made her laugh even harder, clutching her ribs while Dean pounded on the steering wheel, swerving once in what was probably a dangerous manner.

When they finally regained control over themselves, Rose twisted around to smirk at her brother and the angel. Instead of offering an explanation, she gave them both a broad wink.

Her jovial outburst evaporated as they started roaming the streets of Tulsa, looking for her coffee shop. They were relying less on Rose's memory and more on Castiel's sense of where the evil was concentrating.

"Holy shit!" Dean slammed on his brakes. A group of kids, age 9 to 15 were lined up across the road, eyes flashing black in the sunlight, the same evil smile on every face, sending chills up and down the spine.

"Come out and play, Winchesters," said a girl, about age ten, teeth stained blue with the lollipop still in her grubby hand. "What's the matter? Are you chicken?"

All of the other children started laughing and making clucking sounds, mocking both the Winchesters and the very innocents they were using as meat-suits.

"Oh, God," Rose mumbled, feeling the blood leave her face.

Slowly, Dean pulled the demon-killing knife from under his seat. Rose noticed and put her hand on his wrist. "Dean, no, those are just kids. We can't go out there and slice through them."

"Rose is right," Sam said from the backseat. "We're not the monsters here."

Dean wanted to agree, but the demons started creeping closer to the Impala. Dean glanced behind him and saw even more demons closing them off. "I don't want to, but what choice do we have?" If it came to killing those demons or watching Sam and Rose die there was only one option in Dean's mind. He would hate himself forever, but as long as he did his job, his real job, and protected his siblings, then it was the only choice.

Castiel spoke up, "I can kill the demons without hurting the children, but it will take time. More time than we have." He handed Rose his dagger. "You have to stop War, Rose. Cut off the ring."

"Cas, I can't—"

"You can," he insisted. "You have to." He leant across both the consol and Sam to press a hard, almost painful kiss to her lips, then he was outside.

Almost immediately, he was beset by all of the demon kids. They tore at his clothes, stabbed him with knives and sharpened pieces of wood. In a moment, he could not even be seen, except for bits of golden light shining through the bodies. He could be heard though, his voice rumbling with an unknown language, audible above even the shrieks of demonic pain.

The Winchesters used Castiel's fight as a distraction and snuck up the street on foot. Rose began to recognize landmarks and led the way, Castiel's weapon clutched in her hand, the metal surprisingly cool against her fevered skin.

She saw the coffee shop ahead and broke into a run, not realizing that she was running faster than she usually could—outpacing her much taller brothers.

They burst into the Bean There, Done That, bell tinkling merrily above their heads, just in time to see a teenager crumple to the floor, body shaking and trembling while blood and bone seeped onto the floor from a mangled, unrecognizable face.

Everyone in the coffee shop turned to stare at the Winchesters.

Dean was the one to sum up the Winchesters' feelings about that. "Shit."

There was a moment of silence where both sides just looked at each other. Rose frantically scanned the group, not certain how she would recognize War should she see him. She knew he was there, could feel dark power swirling around the room. She closed her eyes and reached deep into her gut for her own powers, grown so much stronger since Hell. She tugged on the feeling just a little and opened her eyes.

"Holy…" She could see black, smoky tendrils, radiating evil, winding their way among the crowd, running through them. She glanced at her brothers and could see them hyper-clearly, the tired lines around Dean's eyes and the mulish set to Sam's strong jaw, both of them blessedly free of smoke. Her eyes were drawn back to a man in the corner, a middle-aged man with a bit of a soft-middle. She blinked and the image shifted, becoming a figure nearly twelve feet tall, taller than the building should have allowed, eyes gleaming black, skin red and cracked, with black power pouring from the crevices, blood staining the wicked pointed teeth.

Rose gasped and took an inadvertent step back, vision returning to that of a normal guy. He smirked, recognizing his foe, gave a condescending nod. He held up his hand and twisted the wedding ring on his finger. That was the signal his line was waiting for.

Rose barely even registered Sam and Dean going into action on either side of her, her focus unnaturally focused on her task of killing the Horseman. Sam and Dean were outnumbered, but had far more skill and presence of mind than the bloodlust-driven yuppies, many of whom were even fighting each other. So she was not worried for her brothers, could feel them on the fringes on her consciousness, knew they were all right.

A man threw himself at her; she side-stepped him easily, tripped him, kicked him in the head once and he was out of the fight. Another three came after. She heard Dean's shout and she almost smiled, big brother still looking after her.

She shoved one back, a little surprised at her own strength, sending him hurtling into a wall. She ducked another's punch, hit him once in the solar plexus, brought both hands down on the back of his neck and he crashed onto the floor. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw War slip out the door. That was all the distraction the last man needed.

Rose felt herself hit a table and tasted copper. He was holding onto her shoulder, landing a second punch to her face. More blood filled her mouth.

The fist was cocked back for another blow, but suddenly, her attacker was lifted clean off of his feet and thrown against a wall by one pissed-off older brother.

She grabbed Sam's hand and scrambled to her feet. No time for words, they exchanged a nod that spoke for them "Thanks," "Be careful," then parted—Sam rejoining the fray and Rose following War out the door.

She caught up with the Horseman just as he reached his car.

He gave an exaggerated sigh when he heard her approach, turned to face her with his smirk firmly in place. "Oh, look, the angel wannabe has caught up with me. Guess I should just give it up then." He held up his hands in mock-surrender, then glanced down at her weapon and started laughing. "Really? I can't even… What do you think you're going to do with that? That flimsy excuse for a sword might, _might_ do some good in the hands of an actual angel." He dropped his hands and his humor. "But you're not a real angel, are you? You're just a pet, a cute little Frankenstein."

She said nothing, just dropped into the fighting stance she had been trained from birth to take.

"All right," he said, cracking his knuckles. "Let's get this over with. I've got better places to be." He waved his hand and Rose went flying into the wall at the end of the alley.

"You know what I like best about being me?" He asked conversationally, walking over to where she lay dazed, blood streaming from a cut on her head. "Humans are already such _violent_ parasites. All it takes is a nudge and you've got a world war on your hands. It's beautiful." She had struggled to her hands and knees, only to have a massive kick connect with her ribs.

Pain blossomed through her. She could not catch her breath. He fisted her shirt front and pulled her up face high. Up close, the images wavered between the man and the monster. He smelled like blood and decay, worse than any body she had ever dug up to burn, so strong that it made even her gag.

He shoved her back against the bricks so hard, she heard ribs crunch, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of hearing her cry out. She could not stop the bubble of blood, however, that burst from her lips, coming from the punctured lung.

He shoved her back down to the ground and spat on her face. "Who do you think you are?" She had dropped Castiel's weapon when she had hit the wall. He retrieved it with a smirk, then he turned, leaving her to die in that alley.

He sorely underestimated her.

She grabbed a piece of pipe out of the refuse spilled from the garbage container near her head. Gritting her teeth against the pain, she struggled to her feet, her palm slippery with sweat and blood.

Her at-first unsteady steps gained strength and grace, her back got straighter as she called on her power. She could feel it flow through her, feel her skin knit together and break apart on new ways. She looked down and saw that her weapon was no longer a rusty pipe, but instead a shining sword, with white jewels on the hilt and white flames along the blade.

She could feel her brothers still, fighting their own battle. She could feel their love and courage and strength at her back, supportive like a shield wall of old.

"Hey!" She called out to War in a voice that was both her own and unfamiliar. "You wanted to know who I am!" The Horseman turned and stared, terrified by the sight before him. She grinned and swung her sword in an arc that would have made John proud, severing War's hand from his arm. His scream was so inhuman that she could hear it rip the tissues of the human throat he was borrowing. She pinned him up against his car with her power and positioned the tip of her sword above his heart. "I'm a fucking Winchester, you bastard."

Rose drove the blade home.

He crumpled around the weapon like plastic melting in a fire. She stepped back, pulling the sword with her, watched it transform back into a pipe.

She turned back to her brothers, saw them staring at her from the alleyway. She was still full of power, her hair flying around her face, caught in a wind they could not feel and the shadows of invisible wings stretched out on the ground to either side of her. She gave a smile though, that was all Rose.

Then, just like that, she crumpled and fell to her knees, and their little sister was back, fragile and small. They ran to her, Sam reaching her first.

"Are you okay?" He asked, kneeling by her side.

"Yeah, just, really tired." She looked over at the coffee shop. "How is it in there?"

"As soon as you cut off the ring, everybody was back to normal," Dean answered, looking down at the shriveled remains of the Horseman, then back to his sister with a bit of awe in his face. "Confused as hell though." He heard sirens. "We need to find Cas and get the hell out of here. Can you stand?"

She nodded. "Just need some help up."

Sam just swung her into his arms. "Let's go."

Before they could go anywhere, however, there came the sound of someone clapping, slowly. "Well done," said a new voice, smooth but cold.

A man, around 40, with dark-blonde hair appeared in front of them, blocking their way to the Impala.

"Who are you?" Dean asked, aiming his .45 at the stranger's heart.

He just smiled and looked at Sam. "Sam here knows. Don't you, Sam?"

Sam did. He did not know how, but somehow the answer was inescapably clear. "Yes." He carefully put Rose on the ground, then took a step in front of her, hoping to act as some sort of shield if necessary.

"Lucifer."


	10. Man of Wealth and Taste

AN: Thanks to all of my loyal reviewer. I can't believe that no one is tired of me yet… And thanks to Lynn for being the best beta!

Lucifer bowed, smirk firmly in place. "I always knew you were the right one, Sam. Azazel still held his try-outs, but I always knew you would be the one."

"The one to what?" Sam asked in a far braver manner than he felt. Rose wanted to see more than the faded, bloodstained plaid of Sam's shirt, so she edged slowly around her brother. She was afraid to look with her second sight. The Morning Star was the most beautiful of God's creations and she feared for her eyes. However, she did not need to check; she had no doubt that it was Lucifer if only because Sam was so certain.

Sam did not know how he was so sure, but some part of him, some part beyond the control of his conscious mind recognized the Devil and was happy to see him. The feeling made him sick.

The corner of Lucifer's mouth lifted a little further. "There's a reason for that feeling, Sam, the way that you know me."

"I don't…" Sam did not even know what he was denying.

"I was cast out by my Father," Lucifer interrupted. "But I would have left. He was afraid that I would take over and He was right. I would have if my brothers had not betrayed me. I wanted to though, still do. He showed me His weakness when he created humans. He wanted us, _us, to_ serve a group of pathetic, weak, stupid, petty, arrogant creatures. I refused, rebelled, and my brothers turned on me. I wanted, I want to hurt them, make them regret their betrayal. Sound familiar, Sam?"

"No," Sam denied, his stomach continuing to churn.

Lucifer actually had the audacity to look offended. "Make you a deal, Sam. I won't lie to you, and you won't lie to me."

Sam said nothing. Making deals with devils never turned out well, especially not for the Winchesters.

"You mean to tell me that," Lucifer continued, "when John Winchester heard about your acceptance to Stanford and told you to 'walk out the door and not come back,' you weren't outraged? When your big brother, your hero, did not help you, just dropped you off at the bus stop with your bag, when he did not even look back-you didn't want to hurt him, make him feel your wounds? When your little sister looked up at you like you were the traitor, you didn't die just a little bit inside?"

Sam felt the blood drain from his face. He did not dare look at his siblings, could not stand to see their faces. He had buried those old hurts deep, but Lucifer's scratching had them bubbling over the surface.

Lucifer's grin widened. "Don't you see, Sam, you were chosen, long before Azazel gave you his gift."

"Chosen for what?" Sam gritted out, still staring down the Devil.

"To be my vessel," Lucifer answered, arms wide, like he imparting some great gift.

"You're wrong." He wanted to take a step back, shout, but instead, his legs refused to work and his voice was quiet, subdued.

"Haven't you already got one?" Dean's voice startled Sam. He shook his head trying to clear the fog that Lucifer's words were leaving behind. He knew that the Devil was trying to cast a spell and he knew that he had to fight it back.

Lucifer smiled, and something in him shifted. The skin from his vessel started peeling off, dropping down like fat from a meatloaf. "Nick here, he's not really enough to contain me. He's not my true vessel." He turned his attention back to Sam. "You know I'm not wrong," Lucifer stretched out his hand. "The problem with humans, 'normal people', is that they're stupid. You used to think otherwise, but, after school, you knew it was true. How could they be so ignorant of the darkness out there without choosing to be? It was so obvious. You were stronger than them, smarter, better trained, and they did not even recognize it. They stifled you. You've never felt at home anywhere, not even in little Jessica's bed." Sam shook his head mutely, trying to resist the spell. Lucifer took a step forward. "Come. Be my vessel. You'll finally belong. You'll feel like you did when you drank Ruby's blood. You'll be invincible."

Sam's mind was whirling, Lucifer's voice bringing seductive images; all of the demons bowing before him, Dean tinkering on cars safe and sound, Rose reading in the shade, their parents back, Jessica… He took a step forward.

"Say 'yes' Sam."

"Sam!" He heard Dean, dimly felt Dean grab his arm, felt more keenly the punch the split his lip. "Snap out of it, Sam! You're not like him."

"You can't fight destiny, Dean," he heard himself saying. Part of him wanted to pull away and part of him wanted to lean in, leaving him a still and trembling figure.

The streetlight exploded over Rose's head and Sam felt something warm envelope him. He looked over and saw the shadows of the wings Rose had grown when fighting War. She was holding him, while Dean stood between his siblings and the Devil.

Lucifer looked startled at their intervention. His power slipped. Sam looked at his sister and saw blood starting to trickle from her nose, saw her mouth moving. He could dimly hear her. "Come on, Sam, remember, please, snap out of it."

Lucifer snarled and pushed his hands outward. Rose was thrown back, but she dug her heels in and skidded to a halt. The blood came down more freely and the sight of it, the sight of Lucifer's face, almost frightened at her resistance, the sight of Dean raising his fists, prepared to fight Satan to buy his brother time to come to himself. Those sights grounded Sam, gave him something to cling to. He pushed back Lucifer's fog. "No," he said quietly. "I won't do it. I'm not like you."

Lucifer recovered from his shock and laughed. "Yes you are, Sam." He sent a fresh wave of power Sam's way, but Sam knew it was coming and clung to another set of memories. The $500 of hard-earned pool money that Dean slipped into his bag, the spare key to the Impala that meant Sam always had a home to come back to. The memory of weekly phone calls with his sister until _he_ stopped answering. The worn carved initials in the backseat of the car. It might not have been four walls, but it was a home none the less. He grinned.

"You cannot cloud his judgment," said a new voice, Castiel's voice, as the angel appeared next to Dean. "To be a vessel, the choice must be made by Sam's own free will."

Lucifer bared his teeth. "So say the servants of God."

"I say no!" Sam's voice was as strong as his will. "I disobeyed my Father because I wanted something better, better for all of us. And I would DIE Before I declared war on my siblings, no matter how much they pissed me off." He felt, more than saw, Dean's smile. "And normal people? I, we, save them. I will never be your vessel."

Lucifer bared his teeth even more, let more skin drop off until he looked like something out of a nightmare. "Wait till I—"

"You will not touch Sam Winchester," Castiel declared, stepping in front of Dean, in front of all of the Winchesters. "Not while I draw breath."

Lucifer's expression turned from enraged to confused. "Why do you care so much?"

"Because Sam Winchester is my friend."

The declaration filled Sam's heart with an unexpected warmth. He shared a secret smile with his sister.

"Your friend?" Lucifer laughed. "The younger brothers have no emotions but obedience."

"I do."

Lucifer blinked. "You've fallen."

"Yes," Castiel admitted.

"Then you should be joining me," Lucifer urged. "Sooner or later they will turn on you too, you're disobedient."

Castiel nodded. "I know that, and I will surrender when they come. I will not fight Heaven, but I will fight you." He pulled what looked like a beer bottle with a rag stuffed down the neck. He used what Rose thought she recognized as Dean's lighter to set fire to the cloth.

He threw it against Lucifer, bottle exploding against the Fallen Angel's chest. Lucifer screamed as his body caught fire, vanishing in a puff of smoke.

Castiel took no time to look satisfied. "He'll be back soon. We should go."

"Did you just Molotov Satan?" Dean asked incredulously, blinking when they were suddenly at the Impala.

"Holy oil from Jerusalem," Castiel answered, not quite sure what a 'Molotov' was.

"That was awesome!"

Dean broke all speed limits getting them out of Tuscan, out of Arizona. Castiel disappeared a few minutes out, and Rose fell asleep a little after an hour on the road, back to her normal self. The wings seemed to come and go like her powers, like she was her own vessel for some of the time and their little sister for the rest.

Sam, who was riding shotgun, smiled fondly at the way she contorted around the seatbelt. "They always say that when kids grow up they sprout wings. Trust Rose to take it literally."

Dean glanced in the rearview, terrified that he was losing his baby sister. "Yeah," he said instead of voicing his fears, "but as long as she drools I guess we're okay."

Sam chuckled, his fingers idly tracing the dashboard.

"Hey, Sam, what Lucifer said, about me the night you left-"

"Forget it, Dean." He gave his brother a small smile. "We both bled that night. It's behind us."

"Good." He glanced back again at Rose. "Good."

They finally stopped outside a motel in a city whose limits sign they did not even read. Rose, who woke up when the car rolled to a stop, hung around outside while her brothers got a room on the second floor, listening to some crazy evangelist talk about the end times to the parade of hookers walking past.

"You don't know the half of it," Dean mumbled, pushing his sister until she started up the stairs.


	11. Into the Fire

AN: Thanks to Lynn for being such an awesome beta.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but Rose. Supernatural and everything else belong to Eric Kripke. I am making no money.

For the first time in her life, Rose elected to take the last shower. Predictably, it got cold in the middle. She laughed; Dean might tease Sam about secretly being a girl, but Dean was the one who took long, hot, showers and who kept his own shampoo in stock.

Her laughter turned to tears: tears for the lives her brothers had never been able to live, tears for the way they would hate her for the sacrifice she was about to make, tears of guilt that she had never been the sister they deserved. She slid down until she was curled into a ball on the ceramic floor of the shower stall. She bit her lip to keep the audible sobs from escaping, watching the blood wash away under the spray.

Eventually, she cried herself out. Feeling far older than her 18 years, she turned off the faucet and dried herself, rubbing herself raw on the scratchy motel cotton towel.

She dressed very deliberately; the threadbare, dingy gray t-shirt that Dean always wore when he worked on the Impala-complete with oil stains, her favorite pair of jeans belted with the belt, which she had stolen in the car, from Castiel's trench coat, and a strip from one of Sam's plaid button-ups as a bracelet with another around her ponytail.

She thought about leaving a note, but she knew from experience that a note made nothing better. Besides, she had no idea what she could possibly say.

When she left the bathroom, she saw Dean stretched out on his bed, on top of the covers, fully dressed, and sleeping soundly. She gave him a fond smile and kissed his forehead softly. "Dean," she mumbled, suddenly unable to leave without saying anything.

"Wha'?" He mumbled, eyes slowly lifting to half-mast. "Rose?" He started to sit up. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine." She smiled as her brother's eyes slid shut again. "Do you remember that time, when I was five, and I spilled orange ice cream in Dad's duffle?"

"…Yeyah." His native Kansas always came out stronger when he was sleepy.

"And you lied and told him that it was your fault? And he made you do 250 extra pushups every morning for two weeks?"

"Mmhmm" He opened his eyes again, usual emerald dulled to a mossy green with exhaustion. "Why did you wake me up to talk about it?"

"I never thanked you for that, Dean. I thought I should. So, thanks." She bit her lip and looked down at the floor. "You've always been there, looking out for me, you know? And I feel…I don't want you to feel taken for granted, I guess."

"Are you okay?" He asked again, touched, but worried. The Winchesters were not so famous for emotional chats at…o'dark thirty in the morning.

"It's the end of the world." She forced a laugh. "Seems like I should talk about that stuff, at least, you know, once."

He sighed and closed his eyes again, smiling a little despite himself. "Go to bed, Rosie."

There was much more that she wanted to say, but could not. "Goodbye, Dean."

"Where are you going?"

"…To get a soda, Deano."

"Take a gun," he mumbled, rolling over and falling asleep before the motion was over.

Sam's bed was empty and she hated it, wanted to see him, but could not wait any longer. She knew that, if she did, she would lose her nerve.

She slid on her battered old boots and walked out the door. She was almost to the stairs when she heard a voice. "Sneaking out in the middle of the night?"

Rose whirled around to see her brother leaning against the wall. "Oh, Sam, I was just going to get a drink."

"Why don't I believe that?" He was teasing her, but she was so upset that she did not recognize it.

"Oh, great! So now you don't trust me? Thanks, Sam."

"Woah!" He held his hands in front of him and put on bitch-face number seven. "I thought you might be going to meet Castiel. I'll leave you alone."

Guilt immediately flooded through her like ice water. Sam had turned around, but she lunged forward to grab his sleeve. "Wait! Sam, I'm sorry."

He turned to face her, frowning and arms crossed.

"I'm sorry," she repeated, so quietly that he almost missed it. "The last thing I want right now is to fight, Sammy." Her eyes filled up slightly with unshed tears and he relented.

"Don't worry about it; it's been a long day for all of us."

She smiled. "Yeah." She moved her hand to his elbow. "Are you okay?"

"Fine, Rose." He was, in fact, very far from fine, but he was not about to say so.

She squeezed his elbow gently before letting go. "You did the right thing."

He snorted. "Because you, Dean, and Cas were there to help me." He shook his head. "If I'd been alone-"

"You still would have done the right thing," she insisted. "You don't need us…me…around to make sure of that." Before he could react to that, she took a step back and turned away. "I'm going to get that soda now." She was almost to the steps when she said, while very carefully not looking at him. "When you left for Stanford, I didn't think you were a traitor. I was proud of you, Sammy."

Concerned, Sam watched her disappear. In the morning, after they had all gotten a good night's sleep, or the closest the Winchesters came, he and Dean would figure out if there was something besides the end of the world on her mind.

He never suspected that he would not get the chance.

Rose took a deep breath of the cool night air, caught the smell of stale cigarettes and cheap whiskey mixed with the smells of oil and asphalt. Her bleak surroundings were eerily illuminated by the green neon motel sign. She looked at the hooker highway prophet and gave a tired half-smile.

She unlocked the Impala with her spare key and sat in the passenger seat. She felt the familiar leather wrap around her like it had since her childhood. She leant back and waited for the tears, surprised when they did not come.

She had forgotten paper, but she tore a page from their dad's journal which always resided in the glove box.

_Cas,_

_I wasn't going to leave you a note, but I had to say goodbye somehow. When you kissed me by the drink machine at that motel, I wasn't ready to talk. But you deserve that talk and this is the best I can do._

_I love you, Castiel._

_You've always been there for me. You shared your soul with me. But that's not why I love you. I love you because you fell for me, because not only did you save my life, but you think I'm worth saving. I love you because you're bright and good and capable of so much. You're an angel and you're the most beautiful thing in my life. Don't ever change._

_I hate to ask you, but, please, look after Sam and Dean for me._

_Love,_

_Rose Winchester_

She attached the note under the windshield wiper and made her way over to the preacher. "So, you talk to angels, huh?"

The small, mousy man blushed. "I know I sound crazy, but I really do. The end really is coming. I've foreseen parts of it—Lucifer rising in an old barn, War, Death, it's all coming, some of it is already here."

"I'm not saying that I doubt you. Have you seen the state of the world lately?" She smiled a little, amused by the game she was playing. "So, prophet… How'd you land that gig?"

"Beats me. One day I am a bad writer with a worse drinking problem and the next I've got an angel named Zachariah telling me that I'm chosen to be the writer of the New Revelations."

_Zachariah_, the magic word. "Can you do me a favor, Prophet?"

He grimaced. "I go by Chuck, Chuck Shirley."

"Rose Winchester."

She had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing at his reaction; His eyes went very wide and the hand he was holding out for a shake started to tremble. "Y-you? I-I-I've had visions about you!"

"It's the lighting." She motioned around the lot.

"No, no it's more than that."

"Don't tell me, I'm shorter in real life, less angely?"

Chuck's eyes scanned her face in a way they had not before. "More tired."

She did not know what to say to that, so she cleared her throat, shifting her weight from one leg to another. "So…about that favor?"

"Anything."

"I need directions to a bar about 30 minutes away from here…"

He gave them to her.

"And I need you to tell Michael to meet me there in an hour. Can you, will you, do that?"

He gave her a sad look, like he knew exactly what she was planning. "Sure."

"Thank, Chuck."

"Take care of yourself, Rose Winchester."

Thankful again for her brother's car teachings, she went over to an old Forde, jimmied the lock, and hotwired the engine. She could not help but smile at the irony, stealing a car and leaving to meet an archangel.

She took out her cell phone and dialed a familiar number.

"_Hello,"_ said a gruff voice.

"Hey, Bobby," she said, hands firm on the steering wheel.

"_Rose? Why the Hell are you calling me at 2 in the morning? What fool thing has your brother done now?"_

She laughed, a choked sound. "Nothing, Bobby. Everything's okay."

"_You sure about that?"_

"Yeah. I'm sorry if I woke you, but…I just, take care, Bobby." She could hear him starting to answer, call her name, but she threw the phone out of the window, stepped on the gas, and did not look back.


	12. Love is a Battlefield

Disclaimer: I own nothing, except Rose.

The bar, otherwise known as the Blue Whale, was apparently owned by a man with a strange ship fetish. The walls were decorated with paintings of schooners, so many that the frames touched, there was a collection of ships in giant beer bottles above the bar, and a captain's wheel above the jukebox.

Rose went over to it hopefully, only to realize that it was only a prop and that the music was really coming from behind the bar. "Damnit." She ordered a beer and took it over to a table in a deserted corner in the back. She took her first sip just as the speakers started blaring _The Final Countdown_. "Seriously?" She groaned and slammed her head on the table.

30 minutes later, she had made her way through half a beer, _Flirting with Disaster, Highway to Hell,_ commercials for two dating sites, a new erectile dysfunction medication and _Hysteria._

Rose still had her head on the table when someone pulled up a chair next to her."The universe is laughing at me," she declared sitting up straight and meeting a pair of familiar brown eyes and Marine uniform. "Glad you could make it."

Michael smiled. "Anything for you, Rose."

She snorted. "Yeah, thanks for the help with War."

He grimaced. "Sorry about that. I got kind of busy."

"'Got kind of busy'?" She almost shrieked, catching the looks of other patrons. She smiled and appropriately re-lowered her voice. "That is what you say when you get caught up at work and can't make my birthday party! Not when you send people out to defeat a Horseman and then don't show up."

Michael smiled a dangerous smile and put a stick on the table. Rose blinked, saw the stick twist into an ugly, bloody, scaly arm with a twisted claw at the bottom. She shook her head and it turned back into a large, knotted stick. "I. Was. Busy."

"Ooookay." She took a sip of beer and gingerly scooted the log away from her line of sight.

"Besides, I did not know what you were going to see." He held up his hand to get the bartender's attention and motioned for a beer of his own. "The gift of premonition lies entirely with humans. If I had known War would be there, I would have been waiting." He glanced at Rose with a questioning look when the bartender delivered his beer. She rolled her eyes and forked over some money. "I thought you would get a frightening vision, realize you were in over your head, and Dean would agree to be my vessel." He smiled. "I underestimated the Winchester capacity for stubbornness."

"We had help…from Castiel."

"Little brother." Michael laughed. "He was always a good fighter. But so many questions. Always, either me or Lucifer, always asking questions, especially about humans."

"That's kind of hard to imagine," Rose said, picturing the solemn man, angel, that she knew.

"He was very young." Michael, in a surprisingly human gesture, started peeling the label off his beer. "When Lucifer fell, Castiel was crushed. But he never waivered. His loyalty, devotion to his family, his purpose, I never thought it could be surpassed." She expected condemnation in his gaze, but it was a gentle expression. "I know what you mean to him."

"I-I," Right on cue, the opening chords for _I Can't Fight This Feeling Anymore_ started playing. "Oh, you've got to be kidding me!"

The archangel chuckled. "We did not come here to discuss Castiel, did we?"

"No." It was her turn to peel off a label. "Lucifer… Sam is his chosen vessel."

Michael nodded. "I thought it might be so. Dean is my vessel after all, and Sam is his rebellious, younger sibling."

"Sam is nothing like Lucifer!" Rose protested hotly.

"Sam is a much better soul," he agreed. "But in some ways, they are similar, much as you wish to deny it. And it takes more than similar personalities to make a vessel. It's also a bloodline."

"Bloodline?"

"The Campbells have a long history of being vessels."

It took a moment for the name to ring any bells. "Mom?"

Michael nodded. "Not her specifically, but an aunt. And a few others. You mother knew the path that she was setting her children on."

"You mean…Sam and Dean."

"I mean all three of you." Michael took a sip of his beer and made a face. "This stuff gets worse with every century."

"My mom?" Rose prompted. "She knew what was going to happen? Am-Am I a vessel?"

He smiled. "You're safe so far as I know. Maybe…He's not here now." He took another sip of beer, straight faced this time. "As for what Mary knew, we told her this was all likely, with Dean being my perfect vessel. That was why it was so important that you be born, infused with Grace. To mediate, to keep Sam and Dean together, the way Gabriel…"

"Gabriel? Where is he?"

Michael shook his head. "He left when our Father did." The pain behind the angel's eyes made tears prick in her own. Watching Sam leave for college had been bad enough, she could not imagine him leaving without a trace. "Your mother's death," he continued on his original tract. "We never meant for that to happen, at least," he smiled bitterly. "I did not. Zachariah was responsible for her protection and now we know what he wanted all along—the war between Lucifer and myself."

"Is that what you want?"

"Excuse me?"

"Do you want to fight your brother?"

He took another sip of his beer, straight faced this time. "I can't let him win. But, no, I don't want to be the one that kills him."

"And you can't win without Dean."

"Most likely not, no."

"But, without Sam, neither can Lucifer."

He nodded.

"Dean's never going to say yes. And neither is Sam. So you and Lucifer will be in a continual stale-mate until everyone in the world is dead."

"Thanks for the pep talk," He held up his beer and looked at the bottle. "I wish this worked for me."

Rose smiled wryly. "If you died, then Heaven would be leaderless and chaotic."

"Yes."

"So, you're going to fight to live."

"Yeees…"

"I won't."

If Michael had been human, he probably would have choked on his drink. "You want to fight Lucifer."

She nodded. "When Lucifer saw me, saw what I can do, he looked almost…frightened. All I have to do is hold on until he's dead. After Hell…I'm pretty sure that I can do that."

"We won't be able to bring you back again," Michael said quietly. "Without God's approval, there's a limit to how many times we bring anyone back before the universe is thrown completely out of balance."

She shrugged. "I'm okay with that." She finished her beer and stared at the bottle as if it held all the answers. "This may sound stupid to you, but…I'm tired. I was 4 years old the first time I had a nightmare I knew was a vision of my mother's death. I was 8 years old the first time I stitched Dean up in the back of the Impala going 80 miles down the interstate 'cause the cops were on our asses and Dad was too afraid to go to a hospital. I was 16 when a demon killed my father and 17 when Sam died in my arms, 17 when Dean was ripped apart by Hell Hounds. I was 17 years old when I was strung up on a rack in Hell." She took a deep breath. "I am tired of losing the people I love and I am tired of bleeding. One last fight sounds pretty good actually."

Michael put his hand over hers, which was tapping along with the song on the radio, and squeezed gently. "All right."

"You think I can do it?"

"You might be our best hope."

She smiled. "Okay, but I do want some things."

"I guessed as much. What?"

"Win or lose… Cas can do what he wants, rejoin the Host or not and nothing happens to him."

Michael nodded. "Agreed."

"And you leave Dean and Sam alone. No matter what happens, they walk away."

"I can't promise that Lucifer will leave them alone."

"I'm not asking you to."

He paused for the length of an entire song, Van Halen's _Running with the Devil_ and, really, the universe was laughing at her. "I promise."

"Okay," she said, a little surprised by her own relief. "Okay then."

"Let's go." He stood, campaign ribbons glinting in the bar light. "Do you need to say good-bye?"

She felt the Impala's key digging into her leg through the lining in her pocket. "I already have."


	13. Winchester Repeater

AN: Thank you guys forall the warm reviews Trying to keep these filler chapters interesting before the action starts again.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

When Rose had been gone for more than 30 minutes, Sam started growing concerned. He looked over at where Dean was sleeping peacefully and he knew that he should be resting as well, that Rose often took longer than this on nighttime rambles, but something about it set his teeth on edge.

"Screw it," he mumbled, shutting his computer. Hard. He had dropped his room key on the nightstand, but when he went to retrieve it, he noticed the second card slid behind the table. Which meant that Rose was out there without one, and that was something she had never done in a lifetime of living in hotels.

Suddenly, he was very, very worried.

"Dean!"

The oldest Winchester woke with a start at Sam's shout. "Wha-?" He rubbed his face, glanced at the clock, and groaned. "What, Sam?"

"Rose left her key card," he said, hand slowly clenching and unclenching nervously.

It took a moment for Dean's tired brain to catch up with Sam's energized one. "Shit," he mumbled, reaching for his jacket. All of Rose's things were still there, but he knew something was wrong.

They were headed out to the parking lot when Dean pulled out his cell to call her and noticed that he had four missed calls from Bobby. "You miss any calls?" He asked Sam, redialing Bobby's number and putting his phone to his ear.

"Left my phone in the car to charge."

"_Damn it, Dean! Don't any of you idjits answer your damn phones?"_

"It turned on silent in my pocket," Dean explained, stepping onto the pavement.

"_Is your sister there?"_

"Actually, we are trying to figure that out right now." He said it like he was not panicking, but he was definitely starting to.

Bobby swore colorfully at the same moment that Sam found Rose's phone on the other end of the lot.

"What the Hell is going on?" Dean could hear that fought against panic starting to filter into his voice, but he was beyond caring. He put Bobby on speaker, and Sam came jogging over. "Bobby?"

"I don't know, but Rose called me." The older man sighed, sounds of paper shuffling and liquid hitting a glass were dim in the background. "It sounded an awful lot like good-bye."

"'Good-bye'" Dean echoed. "Why would she need to call you to tell you…?" He remembered the last conversation he had shared with his sister, how strange it had seemed at the time. "Sam…What was the last thing Rose said to you?"

The younger Winchester looked almost guilty. "She told me that she was proud of me, for Stanford."

"Sonofabitch," Dean swore quietly. "You don't think she…"

"Went to meet Lucifer?" Sam finished for him.

"Why would she go and do a fool thing like that for?" Bobby asked, wondering what his kids were keeping from him.

"Not yet," said a trembling voice from behind them. "She hasn't gone to meet Lucifer yet."

"Who the Hell are you?" Dean demanded, then recognized the mousy motel preacher. "What do you know about it?"

"My name's Chuck." He shrugged. "I'm not all crazy when I tell people that the angels tell me stuff." He backed away quickly when the Winchesters moved towards him. "Rose took an old, green Ford. She's going to meet Michael."

"Where?" Sam moved quicker than the prophet was expecting and he hauled Chuck up to his eye level, meaning that Chuck's feet did not even scrape the ground. "When?"

"I don't know!" Chuck squeaked. His fear of Sam helped him cover up the lie. "I just, saw them meeting! It might not be in this city, or today, or tomorrow! I don't know!"

"Why?" Dean growled, fingers clutching the phone so hard it was a wonder that the plastic did not shatter.

"You really gotta ask me that, man?" Despite his fear, Chuck felt incredibly sorry for all of them, and he gave the closest thing to a smile that he could while suspended in the air by the giant, monster-hunting, protective older brother of the girl he had helped with her suicide run. "If there's one thing I've learned about you guys, after having enough visions to fill the Winchester Gospel, it's that you'd all do anything to keep each other safe."

Sam let go with a pained sound that was echoed by Chuck when his ass hit the ground.

"_Dean," _Bobby said quietly, "_You boys come here and we'll figure something out."_

With numb fingers, Dean hung up the phone. He saw the piece of paper under the wiper and almost tossed it to the ground, but then he recognized his sister's handwriting.

"What did she say?" Sam asked.

"I don't know," he admitted shakily; it was too difficult to read past the tears swimming in his eyes.

Sam took it from him calmly. "It's for Cas." He looked over at where his brother was still standing, almost in a daze. "Go get our stuff, Dean," he said gently. "I'm going to see if Chuck can deliver this."

"Okay."

It only took Sam three strides to cross the parking lot. He winced when Chuck shied away a step. "Sorry about that, earlier."

Chuck did not have it in him to be angry when he knew how close Sam was to breaking. He felt bad for lying to the guy, but Michael had told him not to let anyone interrupt. "Don't worry about it, I know that you're usually the nice brother."

Sam tried to laugh, but it came out more like choking. "Can you, this is for Cas."

Chuck closed his eyes, and a moment later Castiel was beside them.

"Sam? What's wrong?"

"It's Rose, she's, she's gone to meet Michael."

The angel frowned. "You must be mistaken."

With a heavy heart, Sam handed him the scrap of paper. He did not know what reaction to expect, but it was not the calm way in which Castiel folded the paper and put it in his pocket. "I expect you are going to Bobby's now," he asked.

"Uhm, yeah."

"Perhaps I can be of some assistance."

"Sure." He could not help but stare. "You aren't even acting upset! You care about her, I know that. She wants to die, and you don't even seem concerned!"

"She made me promise to protect you," he said solemnly, hand drifting to his pocket, touching the letter. "I cannot do that if I am not with you."

"She asked you to," Sam corrected. "You didn't promise her anything! She's not even here."

"That does not matter!" Castiel snapped. He brought the letter out, slightly crumpled and smoothed it out carefully, then refolded it into crisp lines and replaced it in his pocket. "That doesn't matter." He met Sam's eyes, and Sam got just a glimpse of a pain that echoed his own, maybe even surpassed it. "I promised her."

"All right, Cas." He put his hand on the angel's back for a moment, then they joined Dean at the Impala.

The oldest Winchester did not know if prayer would work, but on that car ride, he made every bargain in every prayer he could think of, anything to just keep his little sister safe.


	14. Same Song, Different Verse

Disclaimer: I own nothing. If anyone is interested, I just posted a new chapter of Sweet Child of Mine dealing with Rose's first day of boarding school.

As it turned out, Castiel was amazing at research. He knew the contents of most of even Bobby's more obscure books, and he never needed a translator. It did not matter if it was written in Greek, Japanese, Latin, Hindu, Gaelic, or languages even older. He also did not need sleep or food. He never took off his trench coat, but, in the few minutes he took between books, he would smooth out Rose's note and reread it.

Dean caught him at it when he went down to the storm cellar/demon-proof panic room to get a Mandarin English Dictionary. (Usually, Dean left the studying to the geeks in the family, but with Rose in danger he could not just sit on his hands). "We'll get her back, Cas. We'll figure something out." _We have to_.

The angel carefully refolded the note and put it back in his pocket. He said nothing, but Dean could see the hopelessness in his eyes.

"Dean!" Sam could be heard thundering down the stairs. "Cas! Bobby thinks he's on to something."

Needless to say, Castiel was the first to reach Bobby's side, but Dean and Sam were close behind. The older man's heart broke just a little more at their hopeful faces. He did not know how much more he could lose. "I don't know how much this helps, but…I think Rose is going after the Horsemen."

No one said anything; they just waited for him to explain.

Bobby pointed to stack of newspaper articles piled haphazardly on his battered mahogany desk. "In the past two weeks, Carver Iowa has been the epicenter of some strange disease. Spokesperson said that it was a particularly nasty, mutant strain of flu, but according to the interoffice emails that Sam hacked for me, the CDC had no idea what the hell it was."

"What it 'was'?" Dean leaned across the desk to get a better look at the articles.

"Yesterday," Bobby continued, pushing the papers closer to Dean with one hand, "Everyone who hadn't already gotten killed off by this plague, suddenly got better. People are calling it a miracle."

No one bothered to see if Bobby agreed with that assessment. No one in the room believed in miracles anymore.

"Now, hallucinations were a symptom, but a couple of patients claimed to have seen a doctor turn into something nasty when confronted. His body grew snakelike, but he waved a horrible jagged scalpel in each of his six arms. His face grew," he glanced down at the notebook in his lap, "into that of a snake, complete with a forked tongue and ruby-red eyes."

"Pestilence," Castiel said with certainty in the pause Bobby took to breathe. "He was just as gruesome the first time around."

Bobby nodded, glad for the confirmation. "These same patients also claimed that the person who confronted Dr. No was a pretty girl, with baggy clothes and green eyes, who reacted to the change in the doctor by growing wings made out of light."

Sam and Dean both looked shell-shocked, but Cas' reaction was odd. It almost looked like he had the answer to a puzzle.

"She carried a flaming sword," Bobby continued, "and she cut one hand, just one, off of the monster. The body was consumed with white fire, but the hand she took with her."

"Why is she going after the Horsemen?" Sam asked, wiping his sweaty palms on the back of his pants.

"Practice maybe?" Dean suggested.

"She needs the rings," Cas corrected. "The Horsemen's Rings." He smiled. "That's very clever, Michael."

"Why is that clever?" Sam asked, frowning.

"Dean was right, she does need training and this provides good training. But also…" He pulled a book out of Bobby's shelves and flipped it open to the exact page he needed. It was written in a language that none of the humans, not even Bobby, understood. But on the reverse page was an illustration depicting a whirl of black and red below a small image of four rings intertwined. "The four rings together can open Lucifer's Cage. It is a contingency plan. If she cannot outright defeat Lucifer in the field, then perhaps she can distract him enough to allow Michael to shove him into the pit. Lock him away again."

"That's not really any safer is it?" Dean was not really looking for an answer, but he wished he did not know it.

"No," Castiel said, his hand sneaking into his pocket again, fingers softly tracing the folds of the paper.

"So, what do we do?" Sam asked, looking around the room, the absence of a fifth person hitting him in the gut for the ninth time that hour.

"There are still two Horsemen," Dean said decisively. "She's going to hunt them down. Least we can do is help her out."

Everyone was quiet for a moment until Sam squared his shoulders and asked, "How do we find them?"

Castiel pulled out his note and studied it for a moment. "I am sorry, Love." He went over and, with an air of finality, shut it in Bobby's desk drawer. "I can help with that."

He gathered together some supplies from Bobby's kitchen - myrrh, rosemary, aconite, and devil's shoestring - and put it all in a silver bowl. He then took a copper knife from behind Bobby's tv cabinet, and carved an elaborate symbol onto his arm. He did not even flinch.

He angled his arm over the bowl and let the blood flow freely for a moment before tossing in a lit match. The mixture burned with a supernatural brightness. He held the bowl aloft and spoke a few words in another language that no one else understood, but it reverberated around the room like thunder. He did not yell, but the windows shook and books fell from the shelves. He breathed in the smoke and his body contorted, back bending in a way that should have broken it. He dropped the bowl, spilling the contents all over the floor and let out a muffled cry of pain as the symbol on his arm blazed red.

Just like that, it was all over. Castiel was still breathing heavily, lips showing evidence of blood, when he looked down at his arm. The symbol had formed into a scar that not even his powers could heal. "Los Angeles. They're in Los Angeles."


	15. Under the Bridge

*WARNING* There are some gross images in this chapter. And some somewhat naughty but not particularly graphic content, *cough, porn, cough* but not at the same time. I'm just warning you.

Rose had been to Los Angeles before, back when she was still in school. She had hated it. She hated the cities in general, being confined by millions of people and miles of buildings. They gave her a trapped, claustrophobic feeling that no crawl space or wall panel had ever given her. But she positively hated Los Angeles; hated the grime, the smell, the heat, hated the prickling of violence she could feel along the edges, always out of sight but always threatening to break through.

Now though, she had more of an appreciation for the city. The strings of violence she could feel only sharpened her sense. If she worked hard enough, she could look at someone and see what kind of person he or she was, the same way that she could see a demon inside of a victim.

It tired her, using her powers in that way, and Michael had warned her against it. But she could feel herself growing stronger. It made her want to rush into the path of a bullet, just to see if it would hurt her. She knew, objectively, that sort of thinking might get her killed, but she was itching all over, like something was trying to break out of her skin. She knew that she should be scaring herself. Instead, she looked over at a man with murder in his heart and smiled, dark and dangerous herself.

"Bring it."

Dean had actually left the Impala behind. Getting to Los Angeles in time to help his sister was more important than anything, and he had just let Castiel whoosh them there. He was beginning to regret the decision though, holed up in a no-tell motel with an angel and his little brother and no way to escape.

He was frustrated by Castiel's inability to narrow down the scope of the search, but not nearly as frustrated as the angel was with himself. He was pacing the room and, oddly, eating. He had started with the burger which Sam did not feel like finishing, but then he had gone out six times for White Castle. Even Dean's stomach hurt at the amount of food he watched being consumed.

"Seriously, Dude? What the Hell is up with you?" He groused from his position on the bed, remote in hand.

"It's Famine," Castiel explained, swallowing a hamburger almost whole. "I think he has awakened my vessel's hunger for red meat." Since angels did not usually eat, they apparently did not learn table manners because his next words were distorted by food. "That's what Famine does; he creates an insatiable hunger that eventually kills. If I were human, I would be dead by now."

"So," Sam said suddenly from his research position on the other bed, "a guy who literally eats so many Twinkies that his stomach explodes…that would be Famine?"

"Yes."

"Thought so." He returned his attention to the laptop balanced precariously on his knees, then marked a place on the map next to him. "Does the hunger have to be for food? I mean, if there was, say, a couple of lonely people on a date, could they be so overwhelmed with a hunger for human contact that they…_eat_ each other?"

Dean made a disgusted face, but Castiel just frowned thoughtfully. "I suppose. Pre-historic Assyria was not such an affluent society as this. More people were starving already. Famine did not need to be so creative."

Sam nodded and returned to his map.

"Hang on, if Famine's affecting you so much," Dean turned off the television because Casa Erotica Five was not something you watched with an angel in the room, even if he was giving it interested looks. "Why are Sam and I fine?"

"I am not affected," Castiel said a little too haughtily for someone with half a burger stuffed in his mouth. "My vessel is affected. I might be the only one in here, but that does not mean that this body belongs to me. What I want is quite different."

"Peace on Earth?" Dean joked.

"Not going to happen for a very long time unless we lose," he replied matter-of-factly. "I want to love Rose."

Dean choked on his own spit. "What?" He tossed the remote onto the other bed, ignoring Sam's huff. "I'm never letting you watch porn again."

"That did not make me want your sister…" He cocked his head to the side the way he always did when he was considering something. "Although I do wish someone would explain why the pizza man was spanking the babysitter if he loved her so much."

Dean gagged.

"I think I have a lead," Sam announced, then smiled despite the gravity of their situation at Dean's expression. "End of the world is a little more important that Castiel and Rose's sex life. Focus."

"Yeah, sure." When this was all over, Dean was never leaving her alone again for a multitude of reasons. "Lead?"

"There have been a lot of weird deaths lately that all seem related to Famine. Unless it's routine for people to drink 8 bottles of tequila straight. And they all occurred in a perfect circle around one restaurant in particular." He pointed to a spot on the map, looking understandably pleased with his two hours of work.

Dean nodded. "Seems like a sure bet." Castiel dropped the burger sack, but then Dean reminded him, "You never did answer my question. Why aren't Sam and I affected?"

"Sam's resistance might be stronger since, unlike my vessel, his body is contaminated with demon blood." (Sam winced) "As for you, I have no idea."

Rose too faced challenges in locating Famine, but she took a more direct approach. The lesser demons were less adept at covering their tracks.

There was a heartbeat, she discovered as she stalked her pray, a pulse to the city. It strummed below the sidewalks, through the air. It moved her like the beat of a war drum. She appreciated the irony, Famine hiding in the City of Angels. He should have known better.

Sam, Dean, and Castiel arrive outside a diner named, simply, Carl's. There was a large sign on the front door "Closed for Repairs" but there was also a shiny, black, SUV parked outside.

"Famine rides the black horse, right?" Dean asked.

Sam and Cas both nodded.

"I'll go in," the angel volunteered, his usual silver blade sliding down his sleeve and into his hand. "If I am not out, with the ring, in 15 minutes, then I need assistance."

"Are you sure?" Sam asked, catching his friend's sleeve. "We have no idea how many are in there."

"If there is any way to keep you safe and to keep my promise, I must at least make the attempt," he replied with a small smile.

"15 minutes," Dean said quietly. "Then we're coming in."

Castiel nodded and vanished.

Two minutes later, Dean pulled the demon killing knife out of his boot. "This is taking too long."

"Yeah," Sam agreed, pulling his gun from his waistband.

They snuck around to the back door, fighting down vomit at the smell that assaulted them when they entered. There was a man, bloated with death, surrounded by a puddle of congealing giblet gravy, lying on the floor with maggots coming out of his ears.

They came to a set of double doors, could hear low voices coming from behind them. They nodded, once, and pushed their way through.

The restaurant was dark, except for a bright ring of flames. The flickering light revealed a pile of bodies around the circle, and Castiel crouched within, body drawn into a perfect attack stance. He looked up at the Winchesters, fear crossing his face for the first time. "Get out now!"

"It's…too late…for that." The lights blazed on suddenly. Blinking in the bright florescent glare, it took a moment for the Winchesters to make out the crowd of demons surrounding them. In one corner of the room was an old man in a wheelchair. He was hooked to an oxygen tank and would have been quite pathetic if not for the evil in his eyes. They were old and filmy, but the glare they leveled sent shivers down the brothers' spines.

"It's…too late…for them." The demon clearly had trouble breathing.

Sam and Dean exchanged a look—demons did not take on the infirmities of the victim's body.

Famine let out a wheezing laugh. "This is…what happens when you are…always _hungry_." The last word came out like a petulant whine and seven of the demons converged on the boys.

The fight was quick, but it was bloody. When the demons came close, Sam and Dean got back to back. Dean was the only one with a useful weapon, so Sam concentrated on keeping the hands from his throat and on swinging them into the path of his brother's blade when he sensed Dean had an opening.

However, there were too many opponents, because more demons filed in from other places in the restaurant. Dean gave a bitten off cry when his arm was wrenched behind him and his shoulder dislocated. Again.

They were dragged in front of Famine, who gave them a hard, searching look, film starting to disappear from his eyes."You two are a hard case." He smiled, revealing broken, rotted teeth. "Sammy" Sam gave an involuntary jerk at the stolen nickname. "I know what you want. Ever since…that day with Ruby. You want more blood, just a taste." His voice gained strength as he discovered Sam's weakness. "You want that power back. You want it so much that sometimes your guts twist up inside."

"No!" Sam protested, trying desperately to pull away from the five demons holding him. "It's, it's evil. No."

"It's a part of you, Sam. You could be so strong." He snapped his fingers and one of the demons standing by the wheelchair made an elaborate show of slicing open his own palm, blood welling up thick and dark.

"No!"Sam screamed, forgetting a lifetime of training in a desperate attempt to get away.

"Sam!" From the corner of his eye, Dean could see Sam being pinned down while the cut demon straddled his chest, one hand holding Sam's head still while other tried to force the blood down his throat. "You let him go, you son-of-a-bitch!"

"No, I don't think so." The demons pulled Dean up, until he was inches away from Famine's face. The Horseman's breath was rancid, like putrid, rotting flesh had been stuck between his crumbling teeth for the better part of a millennium. Dean had to resist the urge to gag as Famine resumed his speech, his voice low and conspiratorial. "You, now, I'm not affecting you at all, am I?"

"I guess I'm just well fed."

Famine let out a bark of laughter as one of the demons backhanded Dean across the mouth for his insolence. "I'm not affecting you, Dean," Famine made sure that his voice could be heard by everyone in the restaurant, even to anyone hiding under the eaves outside. "I'm not affecting you because you're dead. Aren't you, Dean." He reached out and touched Dean's cheek with a cold, dry, withered hand in a mockery of a loving gesture. "You've given up hope. You're a failure, Dean. You and I both know it. And because of that, I am going to have to kill you in a much more mundane way than I plan on killing Sam."

Just then, the front door burst open. The lights nearest the entrance exploded in a shower of sparks. Rose stepped into view, hair fastened in girlish ponytail, but her clothes streaked with blood and her eyes flashing with anger.

"Wanna repeat that bit about killing my brothers?"


	16. Hungry Like the Wolf

AN: Finals are coming up, so I thought I would not keep you in suspense. Less of a cliffhanger now. Never say I did nothing for you. Lol

Disclaimer: I own nothing. *sigh*

Rose smiled, cold and dangerous, silvery blade glittering in her hand. Two of the demons flanking the wheelchair moved to apprehend her. She twisted, weapon flashing bright when it buried itself in one chest, scattering blood when it slit across the throat of the second demon. Objectively, Dean knew that he taught her that move, but she was moving much, much more fluidly than he had ever seen her move before.

"That was weak," she taunted the Horseman. "Your brothers threw a lot more at me."

_Stop it_, Dean begged her silently. _Don't get cocky._

"Come on!" she cried out, killing another demon. "Is that all you've got?"

Dean did not know when his sister had gotten so arrogant, but it was going to get her killed. Famine was becoming visibly pissed off, sending more and more demons to fight the youngest Winchester, leaving Dean in the grips of just two hell spawn. He tensed, ready to help, either his outnumbered sister or his struggling brother.

Demons circled Rose, backed her into a corner. It was the worst place in the room to be, and Dean tried to calculate the distance between himself, the demon knife, and her. She edged slowly along the wall, blade held at an angle.

"Not so confident now, are you?" one of the demons spat, keeping a careful eye on her sword.

"I don't need to be confident," she replied with a familiar, genuine smile. "I'm just the distraction." She darted forward, stabbing a demon in the chest, and yanked on the fire alarm. The sirens started and the water sprinklers came on. "Dean!" She tossed him her sword, throwing herself into the fray with just her fists and feet. Dean wrenched his arm free and caught the blade, and delivered death-blows to his two slightly stunned guards.

The sprinklers did their jobs, and the flames around Castiel died down. He calmly stepped over a body.

Dean went over to where Rose was fighting. He threw her back the sword, just in time for her to stab the demon attempting to strangle her. Dean picked up his own dagger and joined in the fray.

Castiel made his way to Sam, pulling off the demon trying to force blood down Sam's throat. There was a flash of light, and the demon fell down dead. Sam spat out a mouthful of blood into the face of the demon sitting on his arm. Castiel continued killing the demons holding Sam down. "Did you drink any?" He asked, pulling Sam to his feet.

"Y-yes," Sam was sweaty and shaking. They both glanced at Dean's and Rose, saw they were doing well. Sam started toward them anyway, but Castiel stopped him.

"Whatever Famine does," Castiel warned in a low voice. "Do. Not. Use. Your. Powers. Falling to temptation only gives him power."

"Enough!" Famine yelled in an incredibly strong voice, startling when it came from such a frail seeming body. He stretched out his hands and the remaining demons, as a chorus, howled in pain. They all fell to the ground with a thud that shook the soggy napkin holders.

Rose wiped away the blood from under her nose and took an uncertain step toward Castiel, not at all sure what was going on. The black demon smoke came pouring out of the bodies. Sam lurched forward, body spasming. His siblings rushed to his side, held his shoulders while, for the second time in his life, he wretched demon blood. The crimson joined the black in the swirling cacophony.

Famine opened his mouth and ushered the whole mess inside with one jerky motion of his hand. Everyone in the room could feel the Horseman's power grow.

Rose could finally see the Horseman behind the old man. He was tall, with a sickly, skeletal face, with lips that pulled back to reveal bone teeth, rotting and putrid. His eyes bulged out of his skull. The flesh was peeling off the bones in wide strips. Rose felt her breakfast sandwich threaten to come up at the smell.

Famine waved his hand and both Dean and Sam flew into the wall so hard that the plaster crunched.

"I know what you want," Famine said, skin dropping to the floor with a wet plop. He leered at Rose and Castiel with his glazed eyes. "Take it."

Dean and Sam watched with horror as Castiel and Rose lunged into each other's arms, kissing passionately. She struggled to push his trench coat off his shoulders, practically ripping at the knot in his tie. He pushed her t-shirt up and dug his fingertips into the tender skin just above her hips.

The couple fell to the floor, Rose straddling his abdomen, locking fingers above his head. Famine smiled and moved closer to them. Then, as one, Cas and Rose lunged upward. Castiel stabbed Famine in the chest while Rose rolled to the side to grab her own sword.

"H-how?" Famine gasped, blood spurting from between the gaps in his teeth. Dean and Sam found themselves free as his power turned inward to keep himself alive.

Rose sauntered over. "We literally share part of the same soul." She laid the weapon against Famine's wrist. "We're a lot stronger together." She pressed down, ears ringing with Famine's screams until, abruptly, as the hand fell to the floor, the screams stopped. The body literally disintegrated in front of them, leaving behind a terrible stench and a pile of clothes.

"Well," Rose said, straightening her shirt self-consciously. "I, uhm, hi." She looked up at her loved ones with a sheepish smile.

Sam was the first one to break the quiet that fell after Rose's words. He walked over and pulled her into a hug that threatened to crack her ribs. He had blood just starting to get tacky all down the front of his shirt, but she hugged him back anyway.

"You've got to stop sneaking out in the middle of the night," he mumbled against her hair.

"I'm sorry, Sammy, but I had to."

"My ass," Dean said, shoving his hands into his pockets. "You didn't have to do anything."

Rose pulled away from Sam and just looked at Dean for a moment. It was unnerving. He had not known whether to expect an angry or a hurt response, but he had certainly expecting Rose to say something. "I'm saving lives, Dean," she replied in a very calm voice. He wanted her to scream, something to show that she was still human. Not this rational angel shit. "How many more people would Pestilence have killed if I had not stopped him? If I had not already been coming for Famine?

Dean did not have a good answer to that and was saved (relatively speaking) from having to come up with one by the sudden appearance of a pretty dark-haired woman. "Touching as this family reunion is," she said in a breathy, girlish voice. "I need to speak with Rose Winchester."

Castiel _whooshed_ over to stand between the two women. "What do you want, Reaper?"

"Reaper?" Rose tried to move around the angel, but was locked in place by a hand on her wrist.

The Reaper smiled. "Cut the watchdog act, Castiel. I'm just here to talk. I promise." When Cas neither moved nor released Rose, she rolled her eyes. "You know about deals with death, I can't break a promise."

He nodded, slowly, and took a pointed step to the side, although he did not let go. "I'm listening," Rose said, twining her fingers with his unconsciously.

"My boss wants to see you."

From the corner of her eye, she saw Sam stop Dean from stepping forward. "Your boss?" She felt her own eyes widen and she gripped Castiel a little tighter. "Death?"

"You know him?" The Reaper laughed. "Relax, it's a joke."

The Reaper had a very contagious laugh and Rose felt herself smiling in response. "So…Death wants to meet me?"

"Chicago. Two hours."

"Chicago is a big city. Can you give me an actual address?"

The Reaper smiled, but shook her head. "You've been surprisingly successful at offing Horsemen. I want you to come alone."

"She's not-" Sam started, but Rose interrupted.

"I'll be there. But you have to promise me my safety until the meeting is over."

"Agreed." The Reaper vanished into thin air.

"Don't even try to talk me out of it," Rose said quickly, addressing the room in general. "Just…don't."

"What else are we supposed to do?" Dean asked, taking a step toward her. "Are we supposed to just watch you die?"

"Yes," she replied quietly. "I know that it isn't easy for you, but I made a choice."

"A bad choice."

"A necessary one," she corrected. "I only love four people in this entire damn world and, this way, none of you has to die." She crossed her arms in a familiar stubborn gesture that made Dean and Sam both think of a little girl who wanted, just once, to help them. "And don't pretend," her voice was barely audible over the sound of her brothers' hearts breaking. "That, if it came right down to it, either of you would chose anything different. Selling your soul is lot worse than volunteering to die on a battlefield." She held her hands out in a pleading gesture. "I'm not a little girl anymore. I haven't been for years." She looked at all of them with a sad smile, before raising one hand into a half-wave. "You have to let me go."

The sound of wing beats was deafening as she too disappeared.


	17. Death Kindly Stopped for Me

AN: Sorry that I took so long, y'all. Finals and writers block and vacation.

Disclaimer: I own Rose, yeah, but that it. Everything else is owned by Kripke and other geniuses.

Rose had never been to Chicago, at least, not that she remembered. She had seen a lot of places she did not remember from car and motel windows. The wind blew cold, and she shivered. She had not been cold in days. She wondered if she was cold because Death was in town, or if it was a psychosomatic reaction to her own knowledge. Or maybe she was just cold.

The same Reaper showed up in front of her suddenly, friendly smile in place. "Glad you made it."

"Wasn't exactly going to run away from Death…" She shrugged as the Reaper's grin widened. "Figured he could find me."

The Reaper laughed. "That is where you are so different from most humans. They spend their whole lives running away from something that's inevitable."

The two walked together down a busy sidewalk in surprisingly companionable silence for about 15 minutes before Rose spoke. "So…do Reapers have names?"

"Many." The Reaper smiled. "My line of work, I try to make people comfortable. I have many faces and many names."

"What's the name for this face?"

"Tessa." They continued walking for another 20 minutes, finally arriving outside a hole-in-the-wall pizza joint. "Well," Tessa pointed at the door. "The bossman's in there."

"Thanks." She put her hand on the door, then turned back to her new friend. "Hey, Tessa…"

"Hmm?"

"When I die, I hope you're the one who comes to get me."

Tessa's eyes widened, but then she smiled softly. "You're a very special person, Rose Winchester."

Rose just shrugged and went inside. The interior was dark, like wearing sunglasses indoors. There were red tablecloths and the once white floors had been worn brown from all of the patrons over the years. Still, the place looked cleaner than most of the eating establishments graced by Rose's presence over the years. There was a delicious smell in the air of tomato sauce, sausage, and cooking dough.

There were a couple of teenagers in a booth in the corner, giggling and sharing a milkshake and a small pizza, cheese dripping onto the table as they attempted a "lady and the tramp" kiss. Rose had to turn away.

There was one other patron; an old man, with a hairline which receded all the way to the back of his head where long gray stands hung down to almost his shoulders. He was impeccably dressed in a dark suit and tie, with very shiny dress shoes. He had a napkin fastidiously tucked into his collar while he ate a slice of deep dish supreme with a knife and fork.

Rose edged cautiously into the seat opposite him. Power rolled off of him in waves, more than the other Horsemen. But not the sickening, cloying stench of evil. Still, he was a Horseman and Rose was not about to let herself be fooled.

"Ah, Rose," Death said, looking up from his plate with a bland smile. "I'm relieved that you came."

A middle-aged waitress in an age-inappropriate green skirt came over to their table, depositing a glass of Coke and a piece of cheese pizza in front of Rose.

"I wasn't sure what toppings you liked, but I assumed I was safe with cheese. You're not lactose intolerant are you?"

"…No." She poked at the crust suspiciously.

"I'm not going to poison you," Death said with that same bland smile. "I am not impatient."

"That's reassuring," she muttered, poking at the crust again.

He calmly put down his silverware and rested his chin on his laced-together fingers. "I know your powers. Tell me, do you sense anything demonic about me?"

Rose tried to will away the illusion of the old man. Nothing happened. "No," she said, admitting defeat.

"That is because I am not a demon. I am not some black smoke easily controlled." He showed Rose his left hand, complete with a ring of a single, large, white stone surrounded by silver. "Unlike the others, this ring does not contain my powers. It was designed as a method of controlling me." He took it off and examined it. "I'm supposed to destroy this city in about an hour with a massive earthquake. There are meant to be no survivors."

Rose, who had been about to take a bite of pizza, slowly lowered the food back onto her plate. "'Supposed to'?"

He shrugged, stiffly, like the motion was foreign to him. "I like the pizza. I don't like being tethered by that juvenile upstart—"

Rose snorted despite herself. "I've never heard Lucifer described in quite that way before."

"I have something of a unique perspective." He took a very long time to chew a very small bite, wiping his mouth delicately with the corner of his napkin. "I suppose you think I'm cruel, not caring if all of these people die 60 years or so before their time. Eat."

Obligingly, Rose took her first bite of her admittedly delicious pizza. "Well, yeah."

"It might be hard for you to wrap your little human brain around this, but do you have any idea how old I am?" Rose shrugged. "I've seen the deaths of planets and stars billions of years before this world was even created. 60 or so years does not seem quite so tragic to me."

It was hard to argue with that. Rose just took another bite of pizza, picking it up with her hands and trying not to smile at Death's face. She was actually beginning to kind of like the guy in a strange, still absolutely terrified of him way. "What are you going to do? About the city, I mean?"

He took her hand in his surprisingly warm, dry one, and dropped the ring into her palm. "Here. If I don't have the ring, I'm not tethered to Lucifer. I can resume my normal schedule."

She closed her fist disbelievingly around the jewelry. "Why are you giving in to me? You don't care if I save the world…"

"Because I'm curious."

She carefully put the ring in her pocket. " 'Curious'?"

"I see people," Death gestured around the restaurant. "I see their lives, their ends, all spread out before me on a gossamer web. But not you. You have a hundred different possible lives and deaths. You've eluded me before." He took a sip of Rose's coke. "You drowned once, but an angel pulled you back from me. That is unusual, but certainly not unheard of. When you went into Hell, I followed you, but you never quite gave up. I realized that you are something new, a hybrid, the first of your kind. You are mysterious, Rose Winchester, and therefore interesting. I'm giving you this ring because I want to see what you can do."

Rose nodded, once, and stood. "Thank you for your help, regardless of your motives. And thank you for the pizza."

"You're welcome for both."

She took a sip of his coke in retaliation for the sip he took. He actually laughed. She walked out into the waning sunshine, a smile on her face, Death's ring in her pocket and an angel's grace in her soul.


	18. The Gallows Pole

AN: So all of you wonderful people, I'm not sure exactly how many more chapters I have, but it's starting its wind-down. I'm so grateful and honored that I've had all of you along for the ride. Special thanks to Lynn, for being amazing. I am posting this one rather quickly to make up for the long wait between 16 and 17.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Rose was finding the limits of her new strengths, and four days without sleep was proving too much. Michael told her that they would set up the meet with Lucifer later, that she was no good half-alive. He offered to bring her upstairs, but she elected to stay on Earth, in a slightly pricier hotel than usual, paying with the money which somehow appeared in her pocket. She knew that she would be going up soon, and permanently, and she liked breathing the same air, albeit a hundred miles distant, as her brothers and Cas.

She splurged on a single, king-sized, mostly because being alone in familiar set-ups was going to make her cry. "I'm really being a big baby about this whole thing," she muttered to herself, sliding down along the door to sit on the warm carpet. "This is not worse that Hell…" Except, in a way, it was. In Hell, she had been fighting to be reunited with her brothers, not to never see them again.

She took off her boots, laughing at her own pink socks with the hole in the toe. She barely recognized her own laugh. It sounded choked and strained. It sounded like John's.

She stood and crossed the room, opening the door of the fridge. She stared at the mini-bar, vodkas and bourbons looking very appealing in the muted fluorescent lights. John's laugh still echoed in her ears, and she slammed the door with a lot more force than was strictly necessary.

She eyed the door to the shower and decided it could wait till morning. With very precise movements, she stripped down to her t-shirt, socks, and blue boy-short panties. She lay down on top of the comforter, exhausted but suddenly unwilling to sleep. She turned on the TV and flipped through several channels of stupid, before throwing the remote across the room. She reached out and turned on radio-part of the alarm and found a classic rock station. It was fuzzy and tinny, but still the soundtrack to home and comforting enough to lull her to sleep.

In her dream, however, the sound was more like the pop of old cassette tapes as Stairway to Heaven played on an endless loop in her brain. Rose could see herself, a very young version of herself, dressed in corduroy pants and a t-shirt with a pony on it that was too small even for her pint-sized self. Child-Rose was hiding behind a mausoleum in an old cemetery, big smile on her face revealing two missing teeth.

Just then, a younger version of Sam -and had the Sasquatch ever really been that small?- darted out from behind a tombstone to join his sister.

Real-Rose smiled. She remembered the impromptu game of hide-and-seek very well. Dean was supposed to be teaching Sam hand-to-hand combat away from prying eyes in the old cemetery. But it was a beautiful day, and four-year-old Rose had gotten bored, so Sam had convinced Dean to let them both train in "evasion tactics" instead.

Rose and Sam hid together; ten-year-old Sam had his hand over her mouth to stifle her giggles, his face already too serious for a child playing a game. He still had his teen years to angst over, but he was already turning into the man Rose knew now.

Like Dean. Rose looked across the cemetery and saw the younger version of her oldest brother walking among the headstones. Unlike Sam, Dean hit his height early. At almost 15, he was already turning into a head-turner. He was still a little bony and his clothes hung a bit loose off of his frame, but his green eyes were too cool and collected and could flash with too much danger for a boy that age to know.

However, Real-Rose could see them shine with mischievousness as he took the long route through the cemetery. She knew that he knew the exact location of his younger siblings, although the hiding children were ignorant of the fact.

At least until he jumped around the angel statue, howling like a banshee. Sam took off like a shot, leaving Rose at the mercy of their brother's tickling fingers.

The little girl shrieked with laughter as Dean held her under one arm and tickled her ribs with his free hand. Sam came out of nowhere and tackled Dean at the knees, bringing him down to the ground with a bitten off curse. Rose rolled away from where she had been dropped and threw herself across his chest in an effort to hold him down while Sam mercilessly probed Dean's sole ticklish spot at the crease of thigh and hip.

Quickly, the dream turned into a nightmare.

A few feet away from where the three children tussled, a platform appeared. Rose watched with horror as John and Mary Winchester stepped up, Sam and Dean followed, then what seemed like dozens of people. Ash, Andy, all of the people they'd ever been too late to save, all dressed in white. Last of all came a figure, dressed all in black and holding a massive ax; Rose recognized herself in the macabre costume.

All of the people in white knelt, in unison. The Rose in black started with Mary; swung the ax through her mother's neck, kicking the head off the stage as the body crumpled.

The Rose having the dream opened her mouth to scream, but nothing came out. Instead, executioner-Rose started to laugh, that same laugh from the hotel room. Stairway to Heaven continued to tussle playfully as the heads rolled off the stage to land on the ground around them.

Real-Rose was sobbing silently, watching it all, when, suddenly, a new voice appeared. "You killed them all. Every one of those people." Lucifer came into her peripheral vision, but Rose could not take her eyes away from the macabre sight. "If you had been stronger. Or maybe you shouldn't have been born at all."

"I know that," she choked out, voice working for the first time. "I know."

"Good." Lucifer sang along with Plant for a few minutes and Rose was never going to look at hedgerows the same way. "If I'd know that all it would take to break you was a little blood and a few nightmares, I would have started this a long time ago."

"I am broken," Rose said quietly, anger replacing the despair. "But I have been for years. I can still fight you."

Lucifer chuckled, clearly not believing a word she was saying. "Tomorrow then? High noon, like in your movies."

Rose was taken aback by the suddenness, but relieved as well. "Yes. Where?"

"It matters little to me."

Rose looked around. "Here." It seemed right to her somehow. "Do you know where this is?"

"Detroit."

"Well," said yet another voice. Rose and Lucifer looked over to see Michael walking up behind Rose. "Now that's settled, we need to establish some rules."

Lucifer snorted. "Oh please, 'rules'. Don't be an idiot, Michael."

"Rules," Michael repeated in a stern voice. "Or I will step in. And little brother, you are afraid to fight me."

The Devil snarled, but did not deny it.

"You are not going to get any help from demons."

"She gets no help from her family either."

Michael looked at Rose, who nodded.

"Agreed," the archangel said.

Lucifer smirked. "Prepare to die, Rose Winchester." Then he vanished.

The Rose on the stage continued her work. Michael gave the vision a distasteful look before waving his hands. All the death and blood vanished. Young Dean stood and held Sam up, brushing the grass off his back.

"You should go home," Michael said gently, watching Dean swing Rose up into his arms. "Spend one more night with your family."

"They're understandably pissed at me…" Rose looked at her bare toe through her sock.

Michael watched as Dean wiped some dirt off a chubby cheek, and Sam helped fit a loose shoe onto a tiny foot. "They'll want to see you." Michael's arm was as warm as Castiel's when he wrapped it around her shoulders. "You're a brave girl, Rose." He pressed a soft, fatherly kiss to the top of her head. "Don't wait out these final few hours alone."

When Rose woke, it was with tear-stained cheeks and Michael's warmth still on her skin.


	19. A Long Expected Journey

AN: A few years ago, this all started by a question I texted to a friend of mine after a SPN marathon.

Disclaimer: I own Rose, but that's just about it. Everything else belongs to Kripke and others.

"All right, thanks Chuck," Sam said, hanging up the phone and going into the kitchen for beer. No sooner had he opened the fridge, than a knock sounded on the back door. "I got it," he called, checking the Devil's Trap on the ceiling before opening the door.

"Rose?"

She looked up at him shyly through her bangs. "Can I come in, Sammy?"

Wordlessly, he stepped back and ushered her in. She stood in the center of Bobby's kitchen, looking around like a stranger and it broke her brother's heart.

"I was getting some beers," he said, like everything was normal. "Make yourself useful and grab a couple for Dean, Bobby, and Cas."

She was grateful for the calm way he was handling it. "Where is everybody?"

"Living room."

"You mean the library?"

It was an old joke; Bobby had so many books that Rose asked once if he ran a library, but it made Sam smile. "You want me to get you one?"

"Yeah." She took a deep breath before walking into the other room. Dean was on the couch, Bobby on the chair by the coffee table, and Cas was standing by the opposite wall. No one said anything as she set three beers on the table. Sam leant on the door frame, two bottles sweating in his massive hands. Rose faced them all and squared her shoulders. "My fight with Lucifer is tomorrow. No I won't tell you where, and if anyone tries to talk me out of it…" her voice broke a little and she had to clear her throat, "I'll leave. But, but I," she shrugged, "totally failed to rehearse a speech."

Bobby snorted and opened his beer. "If I tried to talk any of you kids outta doing something reckless, I'd have a permanently blue face by now. Now sit down before you insult me."

Sam just tossed her a beer and walked around to sit on the other side of the couch, leaving Rose's customary place in the middle completely free.

Dean took a sip of his own brew. "When Dad was first hunting, I had to make sure that we only stayed in places with a sink, because you were too small to fit in a tub, and now you're asking me to just be okay with you facing down Satan." This was not a conversation he wanted to have in front of anyone else, or at all, but Rose still looked ready to bolt so he knew that he had to suck it up.

"I'm not a little girl anymore," Rose said softly.

"You and Sam," he continued as if she had not spoken, "I was looking out for you even before Mom died. No one ever had to tell me to; it was always just my job." He started picking the label off, avoiding all eye contact with either sibling. "And, I know that you've been running into the fire since you were ten years old and Dad had you in the walls of a haunted house finding a body. But I was always there to look out for you." Bobby cleared his throat and Dean shot him a glare. "As Bobby pointed out when Sam was on the phone a few minutes ago… You've pulled my ass outta the fire plenty of times. I know I need to let you grow up." He looked over at Rose for the first time, green eyes glistening, but a genuine smile on his face. "Maybe we shoulda started with dating and not fights with the Devil."

She laughed. "Yeah, maybe." She sat in her spot and looked over at where the angel was watching the scene with a thoughtful look on his face. "Cas?" He nodded. "Well? What do you think?"

It took him a long time to answer; his blue eyes traveling along Rose's face, before flickering to Dean and Sam. The lines around his face deepened slightly as he shoved his hands into the pockets of his overcoat. Those signs coming from anyone else would have looked only a little preoccupied. However, coming from the stoic angel, the signs pointed out that he was clearly struggling with some great internal debate.

"I think we should get married," he said quietly.

Rose's mouth fell open, Sam choked on his beer, and Dean jumped to his feet. "Hang on a minute!" he sputtered. "Just 'cause I said that about dating—"

"Am I doing this wrong?" Castiel asked, genuine confusion in his voice, head cocked to the side like a puppy. "Human marriage customs are so diverse. Should I be asking Dean?" He turned to the oldest Winchester. "Do I need your permission to marry your sister? I am afraid that I do not have any sheep to offer in exchange…"

" 'Sheep'?" Dean repeated weakly. "I don't have any place to store a flock of sheep…. Ah, hell!" He flopped back onto the sofa, so heavily that it groaned in protest and the vibrations jostled Sam. "Whatever Rose wants I guess."

The angel turned to her. "Rose, will you marry me?"

"I, um, I don't… but I can't!" she exclaimed, turning and running out the back door.

Cas and her brothers stared after her dumbfounded until Bobby rolled his eyes. "Well, go after her, ya idjit!"

He found her outside, leaning against the door of the Impala. "Don't you want to marry me?"

"I do, I just, I can't be with you, Cas. I can't do that to you."

"I love you."

She flinched as if he had struck her. "You shouldn't." He said nothing, just waited for her to explain. "I've given up hope, Cas. I've got no faith in myself and I guess I've never had any. I couldn't keep my family together, couldn't save Dad, or Sam, or Dean."

"You did save Dean."

"Not soon enough. Not before he broke. I broke the world, Cas. It's my fault and I know that. I told Dean and Michael that I was doing this to save people, and I guess I am, but that's not even my main reason. I'm doing this because I can't live with being so damn useless. I broke the world and I want to die putting it all back together. I'm old and young and a coward. My soul is all scarred and I can feel that." She kept her face to the ground, although she pushed off the car, suddenly, like she was afraid she would damage it. "It feels like the only good thing about me is that my brothers love me. That you're part of me. Sometimes I dream that I'm lying in the desert with bodies all around me. But inside of me this white, hot thing starts to grow. It's your Grace and it's burning its way through me until all of my flesh just melts away, until there's nothing of me left." Her lips twisted into a dark, sardonic smile. "It's not even a nightmare."

Angels could cry, but instead of crystals or rain, saline flowed down his vessel's cheeks, fittingly human. "Rose…"

She looked up at him then, eyes wide and frightened. "I can see you now. Almost all of the time. I thought the blue of your eyes was your vessel, but they aren't. They're yours. Even when you're really you. I can always see the blue." She let out a choked sob and took another step away from him. "I, I want to do the right thing, I really try. But I'm cold, and you're so warm. And you're beautiful, I want, I want to be beautiful, just once. I want to curl up next to your heart and just disappear. But I can't. Because I'll end up breaking you down, splashing mud all over your white." She took a deep breath, suddenly coming back to herself. "That's why I should stay away from you. I only have one more day left, but you can't be too careful."

He honestly did not know if she was wrong or right. "I've already fallen, Rose. There's nothing else you can possibly do to me."

"Small comfort."

"But maybe," he persisted, reaching out for her with one hand. "Maybe we can save each other. Find some beauty in each other, together. For tonight at least." He kept his hand outstretched and took another step toward her, "I want to be with you. For as long as we have left."

_No one in Heaven or Hell could deny the beauty in the touch of her hand in his…_

When they came back inside, hand-in-hand, Sam nudged Dean with his elbow. "Told you."

"Yeah, yeah," Dean groused, even though he was happy on the inside. "How do we do this?"

"I don't know," Rose said, squeezing Castiel's hand. "It's not like we have a preacher or anything."

Bobby cleared his throat. "I'm not a preacher exactly, but I am legally allowed to perform wedding ceremonies for the indigenous population of Uruguay." When everyone's mouth opened at once, he held up his hand. "Long story."

Rose shrugged. "Close enough."

"You also need rings," Sam said.

"That's what Michael keeps telling me," she laughed at her own joke while her brothers rolled their eyes in unison.

"I've got one," Dean said suddenly very serious. He worked the gold band he always wore off his right hand, leaving a pale line of skin where it had always been. It was their father's grandfather's wedding ring and, since Dean was the only one with a memory of him, he was the one who loved that memento. "This should fit Cas."

"Thank you, Dean," Cas replied quietly.

"I feel naked," he mumbled, blinking a little too quickly.

"Be right back," Bobby said, disappearing into his bedroom. When he returned, he plopped a small, gold band into Rose's hand. "My wife's."

"Bobby," Rose touched the ring reverently. "You don't have to give me this."

"I know that." He stuck his hands in his pockets. "It's no sacrifice. We never had kids, but I've tried to do my best by you three." He cleared his throat. "Now, before I turn into an old woman, who's giving away the bride?"

"Dean?" Rose asked shyly.

He just nodded.

Sam carefully took the rings and stood behind the couple while they faced each other and held hands. Dean put his hand on Rose's elbow and Bobby stood in front of them.

"Clearly," the older man said, "the traditional wedding vows aren't going to work here, so I'm just gonna wing it." He flipped through a Bible for a minute. "So, may everyone who gathers here on the joyous occasion be blessed….Who gives this girl away?"

"Uhm, I do, and, uh, Sam too, I guess," Dean stammered, taking a grateful step back.

Bobby nodded. "So, do you two promise to love each other, be faithful to each other, take care of each other's injuries and sniffles and always watch each other's backs as long as you both shall live?"

"I do," they both said in unison.

"And, if either of you dies and comes back, do you both promise that the aforementioned promises will still hold?"

Castiel's thumb stroked her knuckles softly, "I do."

Rose smiled, "I do."

"Hand over the rings."

Sam did as instructed, then stepped back to stand by his brother. Cas slid on Rose's ring first, then Rose copied him.

"I now, by the powers vested in me by essentially you two, now pronounce you husband and wife. Go ahead and kiss the bride."

Sam and Dean whooped and hollered enough for a crowd as Castiel pulled her into a passionate kiss. They only broke apart when Rose needed to breathe. Sam shoved beer into their hands and they all five spent the next few hours sitting around Bobby's library/living room drinking, reminiscing, and laughing.

Things did not turn serious again until a little after four in the morning, when Rose set down her beer bottle with a resounding _thunk_. "Guys," she said to her brothers, "I need you to promise me that you'll do something… after." No one needed to ask what after meant.

"I need you to promise me," she continued, "that you'll stay together. I don't care if you keep hunting or if you retire and open the world's only garage/coffee shop. Just, look out for each other and stay like this. Friends. I know how angsty the Winchesters get when something bad happens. You can't let that happen. For me, please."

"I promise," Sam said, while Dean could just nod.

She stood and everyone else stood with her. Cas disappeared, but the others all stood stock-still. She hugged them all, clinging tightly and whispering that she used to wish that John would just leave them at Bobby's, that her very first memory was of Sam teaching her how to tie her shoelaces, and that, even if John had still been alive, she would have asked Dean to give her away.

Everyone recognized it as her final goodbye.

When she had disappeared upstairs, Bobby opened up the whiskey bottle.

Castiel was in the guest room; his trench coat, tie, and suit jacket on the edge of the chair otherwise piled high with the books usually on the bed.

"If I had known I was getting married, I would have worn something sexy," she joked, hands shaking slightly as she pulled her t-shirt over her head.

He said nothing. Instead, he walked over and put his hand over the print on her arm. The touch sent shivers down her spine, and she laced her fingers through his hair, pulling him down for a fiery kiss.

After that, they found no words were needed.

Later, as the fragile dawn light shown around them, Rose sat up, blankets pooling to her waist, past the point of modesty. "I don't know how to say bye to you."

Castiel gently pushed her down on the bed and leant over her. "Then do not say anything."

When she could no longer put off leaving, he helped her get dressed; pulling her jeans up her legs and sliding her shirt down her torso. They kissed once more and she vanished.

If she had gone downstairs, she would have found that she was not the only Winchester heading into the fray.


	20. The Darkest Hour

AN: Sorry this took so long-massive case of writer's block. Hope it's worth it.

Disclaimer: I own Rose, but everything else belongs to people far greater than I at this craft of storytelling.

The sign for Peaceful Roads Cemetery was old and hanging to one side over a rusted iron gate. Rose needed none of her angelic powers to break the ancient padlock, hammering at it with the hilt of her knife.

She was early, and, apparently, the Devil did not share her penchant for super-promptness. She wandered around the small graveyard, never losing sight of the gate. Out of the corner of her eye she spotted a tombstone engraved with the name "Winchester." It was a common enough name, and her dad had never mentioned relatives in Detroit (not that she had asked him), so there was no reason to think they were related.

Still… "It's as good a place to die as any," she said, leaning against the headstone. "I don't mean any disrespect." She glanced down, "Egbert. Oh, suicide then?" She winced. "Sorry, that was mean." She sighed, "You probably wouldn't have wanted me as a descendent anyway. But I am trying to save the lives of the ones you've got."

The tombstone never answered because the Devil showed up. He was dressed all in white, lines of his suit crisp with starch.

"Wow," she said with a confidence which she did not feel, "whoever owned that suit deserves to spend eternity as Satan's prom dress."

Lucifer just smiled, too widely, like a cat eyeing a bird. "I'm going to kill you, you know. Very slowly and painfully, until you beg for me to end it."

Rose shrugged. "Possibly." She pulled her knife from her boot. White fire glowed in her hand as the weapon elongated, turning into the same bejeweled sword she used to defeat the Horsemen.

"That's a neat trick," Lucifer said with a mocking edge to his voice. "Now watch this." He clapped his hands together once, and when he drew them apart, a long thin line of white and gold light followed, continuing to grow and shine even after he dropped his hands.

It was too bright for Rose to look at comfortably, but she suffered through it, and continued to watch. She could see the weapon forming through the spots that danced in front of her vision. When the light died down, he was holding a gleaming trident made of silver, with obsidian inlay on the handle, and wicked, jagged tips.

"A pitchfork," she said, eyebrows raised. "Cute."

He shrugged. "I thought I would indulge the popular myth."

She raised her sword into a defensive position, but Lucifer held up his hand. "Patience, little mud monkey. It's not yet 12:00." Rose debated attacking anyway and taking advantage of his distraction. He seemed to read her mind and snarled. He waved his hand and a ring of fire surrounded her, which made her nearly drop her sword in shock. "Do you think I want my victory over the forces of Heaven," he smiled over at her, "meager as they may be, to be unrecorded for posterity?" he put his hands behind his back, still holding his trident, making him look like he had shiny, silver horns. It was disturbingly appropriate. Almost immediately, the gates blew open and a dozen demons filed into the graveyard. They surrounded the fighters, jeering and taunting Rose.

The ring of flames died down when Lucifer held up his hand. A moment later, Rose heard a familiar rumble of a very familiar engine and, above it, the strains of Def Leppard's _Rock of Ages_. The Impala rolled through the open gates, sleek and powerful. Sam and Dean Winchester stepped out, leaned against the hood.

"We want a moment with our sister," Dean demanded.

Lucifer nodded. "You can have 5 minutes to say goodbye." He made a motion with his hand, and all of the demons shut up.

It was eerily quiet in the absence of the taunts. Rose knew he was toying with her, but she did not care at that moment. She was careful not to drag her sword as she walked over to join her brothers.

"What're you guys doing here?" She asked.

Dean rolled his eyes. "Did you really think we'd let you do this alone?"

"I'm not allowed to get help," she said, resting the sword with its tip on the ground, leaving a little scorch mark on the earth.

"We're not going to interfere," Sam said, straightening to his full height. "We're just not going to make you face this alone."

"I believe," said a new, familiar voice from behind her. She turned and saw Castiel standing there in his suit and trench coat, with his usual calm expression, next to a rather dizzy looking Bobby Singer, "That I promised just yesterday to stand by you."

All three Winchesters looked over at Bobby, who shrugged. "Do I look like a ditchable prom date to you kids?"

From nowhere came a sound; a deep bonging, like an old clock chiming the hour. The air around them seemed to vibrate and the shadows cast by the tombstones and the old, dead trees surrounding the cemetery grew beyond nature allowed for that time of day. Midday looked like night. For the first time, Rose was truly afraid. What was she thinking, fighting someone who could change the sun? Then she saw Castiel studying the sky and the shadows seemed to lessen a bit. She smiled. "Save your strength," she told him. "No Hunter can afford to be afraid of the dark."

She did not kiss or hug anyone. The time for that was over. Instead, she picked up her sword and walked through the crowd of howling, raging demons. She did not notice them parting, even as they continued to jeer. She could not feel the power rolling off of her, but they could.

She approached the Devil, who, though he could feel her strength, never doubted his victory. "Time to stop playing, little girl," he said, with a vicious smile. "Now, it'd be much easier if you'd just stand there and let me kill you. It'll be quick I promise."

For a moment, it looked like he would get his way. He whirled his pitchfork forward with a speed that Dean and Sam could not follow. But it passed through nothing but air. Rose had sidestepped at the last minute. She swung her sword in an arc that he blocked, but just barely.

They exchanged a few blows, the clash of metal on metal ringing over the sounds of the demons.

He shoved, expecting her to go flying to the side. Instead, she executed a neat flip, using the air as a springboard and landing on her feet.

"Enough of this," he snarled, snapping his fingers.

Rose had been to Hell, and she knew what she was talking about when she thought that the pain filling her made her remember the rack, the feel a dozen knives slicing into her from all directions. She dropped to her knees, barely keeping hold of her sword. Blood dripped from her nose and mouth; she thought she felt her eyes bleeding. She thought he would come over and finish her, but he made no movement.

Rose looked up and saw a brief expression of confusion cross his face. He snapped his fingers again. The pain started over and she made a pitiful sound, but the confusion on his face only deepened. The demons fell silent at this sign of their maker's failure.

Through bloodstained teeth, she smiled. "What's wrong?" Insides trying desperately to join her outsides, she stood on very, very shaky legs. "That not working as well as you thought it would?"

"It should not be so difficult to kill a human," he said matter-of-factly.

"I'm not purely human though, am I?" She countered, taking a step forward.

"You mean your Grace?" He smiled, turned to face Cas, and snapped his fingers.

Castiel exploded in a million pieces. Bobby stared in shock at his overalls, covered in a fine, red mist, bits of flesh hanging from his hat and snaps. An ear dropped from the Impala to the ground.

"Doesn't seem to be a problem for me."

Rose let out a howl of grief and rage that made Lucifer turn back. Despite her pain, she charged. She moved faster than he was anticipating. Again, he barely managed to block her attack. For the first time, he felt a trace of fear.

"Now!" He called out, and the demons responded.

Two of them came forward and pulled her away, giving Lucifer a chance to catch his breath.

"Sonofabitch!" Dean shouted, as he and Sam ran over. More demons stood in their way. Bobby got one of them with a rock salt loaded sawed-off shotgun, before being slammed against the Impala by a second. Sam and Dean had one demon killing knife, which they tossed between them, the weaponless one attacking with fists and feet and teeth, while they all three tried to shout exorcisms at the top of their lungs.

Rose turned on the demons holding her, twisting to stab one through the face, then clapping both hand over the ears of the second. It screamed as its body filled with golden light. Rose wiped blood from her vision and looked over just in time to see a demon snap Bobby's neck, caught the startled expression on his face before he fell down dead.

"Bobby!" Dean cried out, running over to his fallen friend, tears welling up his eyes. Sam stood over his brother, knife in his hand and teeth bared. He looked like some sort of Highland warrior in a pair of jeans.

The tears, already falling after Castiel's death, flowed even more, masking her face with snot and blood and saline. She saw Sam and Dean fighting back to back, the press of demons growing stronger around them as newcomers arrived to help their fellow hell-spawn. Lucifer lounged against a mausoleum, cleaning his fingernails with the tip of his trident.

She knew that it was time to go with plan B. She pulled the Horsemen's rings from her pocket and snuck over to Lucifer. When she got close, he turned to smirk. "You ready for round two, kiddo?" He snapped his fingers and that same, crippling pain went through her. She fell down to her knees, as blood poured from her face, her skin cracking and bone starting to show through her skin at her shoulder and upper arm. Briefly, she thought about what he could do to her for all eternity with what she was planning, and she faltered. She looked over and saw Dean being pulverized by a group of four demons, saw Sam fighting his way over to his brother. Dean's face met hers, bloody and swelling already beyond recognition, saw him shake his head, "no" and she made her decision.

She threw the rings on the ground and started mumbling the incantation. Almost immediately, a hole appeared in the ground where they fell, some four feet away. The hole started to grow bigger, sucking in air and grass and the bodies of dead demons. The stench of Hell still managed to rise; rotting flesh, the rotten-egg smell of sulfur, and above all else, the slick, metallic smell of fresh blood.

If Rose had anything on her stomach, she would have lost it. The suction from the hole pulled at her, tugging her a few feet forward, before she scrabbled a handhold in the ground. She saw Lucifer clinging to a headstone as the same air sucked at him. She saw the demons running away from the gate, Sam holding Dean's still body on the ground, hazel eyes locked with green ones, silent pleading.

She gritted her teeth and crawled toward Lucifer, pathetic and dying, but too humanly stubborn to go without taking him with her. If she could just pry his hands loose, they would both be sucked into the Cage, never to return. It was enough.

She had almost made it, when Sam stood up. She could not hear him over the wind whipping in her ears, but, suddenly, the noise stopped. So did the terrible suction. The pain did not, however, and Rose looked around, thinking she might have slipped into the Cage without Lucifer; but no, she was still at the graveyard.

"Sam," she croaked, "what?"

"I can't let you go to Hell, Rose," Sam said quietly. "Not again." He faced Lucifer, jaw set. "You wanted me to be your vessel? Does that offer still hold?"

Lucifer nodded, breathing heavy and pale, but trying to regain his cool. "Yes, yes, Sam it does." He smiled, held out his hand. "When we're through, I can offer you power and riches."

"I don't want that," he said viciously, stepping back. "I want you to heal my brother and sister, and I want you to promise to keep them safe."

Lucifer nodded.

Sam took a deep breath, leant down by his sister. "I gotta do this, Rose."

"Sam," blood bubbled from her mouth. "Sam, you can't let him win."

"I can't let you go to Hell." He ran his hands through her hair, once, and, when Lucifer looked away, he winked. "Okay," he stood up and balled his hands into fists. "I say yes."

Lucifer smiled. " 'Bout time."

Light started coming from him—so bright that even Rose had to look away before her eyeballs boiled out of her skull. The heat coming from the exchange, left her shaking, burning off her eyelashes and singeing her hair.

When it was finally safe to open her eyes, she saw Lucifer's old vessel, at least, she assumed that was what the lump of flesh on the ground was. But her gaze was fixed on the form of her brother. She watched with morbid fascination as a quick procession of expression flew across Sam's face. The Devil's sneer, Sam's stubborn jawline, the hands clenching and unclenching, feet making abortive movements on the grass.

When he looked at her finally, it was with Sam's eyes. "It's okay," he told her. "I've got him."

"You've got him?" she repeated dumbly.

"I may have done a little research on people who overcame demonic possession," he said with a proud smile, before clenching his hands to the side of his head. "Oh, God, I can still…feel him. He wants out. I can't hold him for long." He staggered over to the rings, still lying where they had fallen. He started the incantation. The hole reopened, Rose felt the vacuum starting to suck her in. Sam looked at her and smiled, once, almost blissfully, before spreading his arms and falling back into the abyss.

"SAAAM!" Rose screamed, as the doorway closed and locked, sealing her brother and the Devil inside the Cage for all time.

Her body was too exhausted to even cry, her insides growing cold from both despair and imminent death. She faced the spot where Sam had disappeared, vaguely heard through blood stopped ears something rustling in the grass, slowly making its way toward her.

She did not even want to fight, just hoped whatever demon was left would be too bored to toy with her. She felt warm arms lift her, felt herself cradled against a familiar chest. "Dean," she choked out.

"I'm here." His voice sounded like she felt, she remembered him lying there still and swollen and bleeding.

"You're alive?" She asked. She could not move to check, but she knew the arms and presence. "Good." Rose gasped, blood from her lungs catching in her throat. "I'm not gonna make it, Dean."

"I know, Baby Girl, I know." He pulled her against him a little more securely, ignoring his own injuries, his own imminent death. "I'm here, I'm not leaving you. Not ever."

She smiled, "okay then." She stopped fighting. With the very last of her strength, she put her hand on his. She kept her eyes open, but everything went black anyway.

Tears leaked down Dean's cheek. "It's okay," he said again. "It's all right. I'm right here," he kept repeating, rocking her slowly, despite the pain in his ribs. "I'm not leaving you." He slumped over, felt himself fall, kept a tight hold of his baby sister, kept her cradled to his chest. He closed his eyes and felt the rush of death.


	21. Stairway to Heaven

AN: I am nearing the end, folks; only one last regular chapter. You've been the best group of readers in history.

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters, except for Rose.

Dean woke up on his back, gasping, under a bright blue, cloudless sky. He could feel Rose's hand in his, and could hear her labored breathing. Nothing hurt, except the knowledge of the deaths. It was only the tight squeeze of his sister's fingers that kept him from openly weeping.

A dark shape blocked out the sun for a moment. He had to blink to bring the figure into focus, although his sister's awestruck, quiet "Castiel?" and her scramble upwards told him who it was before he opened his eyes.

"Cas?" He looked up to see his friend and Rose standing above him. The angel had one arm wrapped around her waist and one reaching down to pull him to his feet. Dean looked around and saw that all of the demon bodies were gone, that he and Rose were even clean, and asked the first question that came to mind. "Cas, are you God?"

He smiled. "That's a nice compliment, but no." Carefully, he pulled a piece of grass from Rose's hair. "But I do believe that he brought me back." He noticed Bobby's body and left Rose, suddenly appearing at Bobby's side.

"How do you know?" Dean asked.

"Would you know your Father's presence?" He reached down and touched Bobby's forehead.

The older man jumped up with an audible pop of his joints. "Cas! How did you? What?" He shook his head and looked around. Rose waved at him, everything blurry through her tears. He waved back. "Where is Sam?"

Before anyone could answer a new voice said "Right here."

Sam was lying on the ground, directly over the spot where he had jumped. He had barely gotten to his feet when Rose launched herself at him for a bear hug. "Sam!"

"Hey, Rose," he smiled and wrapped his arms around her.

Dean walked over a little more sedately, but wrapped his arms around the both of them as much as he could.

They all pulled away after a moment. "How do you feel?" Dean asked his brother.

"Fine," Sam said, awed expression on his face as he pressed his hand on his own bicep. "Better than fine. One second, Lucifer was starting to tear into me and the next…I was here. Good as new."

"Speak for yourself," Bobby grumbled good naturedly. "I've still got bad knees."

"Cas thinks it was God," Rose said.

Bobby was watching the entrance to the graveyard, "Uhm, who's that?" He pointed at the man walking through the gateway.

"No idea," Dean mumbled, clenching his hands into fists.

They watched as the stranger came more clearly into view. To Sam, Dean, and Bobby, he looked like a short guy with a big nose and longish hair. He had a calm air about him that soothed their worries.

Castiel stepped forward, toward the stranger, an incomprehensible look on his face. "Brother?" he breathed.

"It's Gabriel," Rose whispered to her own siblings. "I don't know how I know that, but I do." She could not see the angel for what he was; it was like her powers were not working. Yet, she felt a pull towards him, a connection that gave her his name like magic. She dimly remembered Michael telling her that she was also a vessel for the youngest archangel.

Gabriel smiled. "Hello, Castiel. I have missed you, little brother."

"You left," Castiel said. "You and Father."

"We're back."

Castiel looked up at the sky. "You and Father." Despite his earlier belief that God had brought him back, he was clearly doubtful that He was truly back.

Gabriel nodded.

"Oh that's great timing!" Dean exclaimed. "He decides to come back now; we've already done all of the hard work!"

Rose was strongly tempted to step on Dean's foot, because, hello, smiting, but Sam beat her to it.

Gabriel just smiled, a surprisingly easy-going smile for one of the archangels. "He knows how much work you have done, Dean—you and your siblings. He is proud of you all."

"'Proud'?" Dead snorted. "That's just great. You know, a little help would have been nice, but I guess that was too much to ask for."

Gabriel raised one eyebrow at Dean's outburst. "Did God set Lucifer free? Or did you?"

"The angels helped a bit," Dean grumbled.

"Some of them were unfaithful, and they have been dealt with." He leant against casually a tombstone, Rose smiled to herself when she saw that it was the same tombstone upon which she herself had rested. "Besides, He has helped you. Who do you think saved you when Lucifer rose in that warehouse? Who instructed that Rose be given Grace in the first place?" As he talked, he ticked the points off with his fingers. It was such a human gesture that Rose was taken aback, until she remembered that Gabriel was God's communicator. "And who brought you all back today?"

He smiled at their silence and rubbed his hands together briskly. "Now that's sorted, let's move on to the rewards."

"Rewards?" Sam asked, flabbergasted at the word.

"You just defeated the Devil, sacrificed yourselves for the world and each other. Did you really think that would go unrewarded?"

All three Winchesters sort of shrugged and murmured their affirmatives.

Gabriel came very close to rolling his eyes. "Castiel."

The other angel looked almost startled at being mentioned. "Yes?"

"Michael needs a new right hand to help him lead the Host since Zachariah was…handled. He thinks you're the only real choice."

Rose felt her eyes well with tears of both sorrow and pride.

Castiel took a step toward his brother, "I , I am honored. But I do not want to leave Earth."

"Cas," Rose's voice cracked more than she would admit to later. "This is what you want, I thought, being back in your family's good graces."

"Not if I have to leave my new family behind," he said, reaching over to grab her hand. "I promised you that I would watch over your brothers and I promised myself that I would watch over you." He looked over at the archangel. "I can do that better from down here."

This time, Gabriel truly did roll his eyes. "You are beginning to view time as a human does." When Cas did not reveal that he was joking, his brother sighed. "Your vessel will age and die, as you knew it would. When that happens, you may rejoin the Host permanently, although you will be welcome any time you wish.

Castiel bowed, and the Winchesters felt the brush of invisible wings.

"As for you three," Gabriel turned his attention back to the Winchesters. "I cannot promise you immortality, but I don't think you want that anyway, an eternity of hunting."

"No," Rose said quietly. "We don't."

"However, you may be secure in the knowledge," he promised, "That none of you shall pass on before you are all ready to let go." He winked at Bobby. "That goes for you too, Mr. Singer."

It was honestly the only thing that any of them would have asked for.

Gabriel raised his hands in blessing. "Go with peace." He started to walk out of the graveyard, but turned at the gate. "Although, if history has taught me anything, it's that you'll be looking for a fight before too long."

Between one step and the next, he was gone.


	22. Ramble On

AN: And now, my dear friends, I am posting the final chapter of the Rose Winchester Chronicles. Thank you all for sticking with me so long and so faithfully. You've all become a sort of internet family and I cannot tell you how much your reviews have brightened up my life. Thank you Lynn for being such a wonderful beta and JustWhelmed for being such a wonderful creative consultant.

AN2: This is the final chapter, as I said, but I could not resist and epilogue.

Disclaimer: I own Rose, but that's it.

The Winchesters made the long drive to Bobby's in near silence, with just the soft crackle of the radio on various swiftly fading classic rock stations and the purr of the Impala's engine for ambience.

They spent a few weeks at Casa de Singer, enjoying Bobby's surprisingly good cooking and his unsurprisingly bad alcohol. They taught Castiel how to play poker, and, of course, how to cheat. He was very good at 21 because counting cards was easy and very bad at 5 Card Stud because bluffing was not.

Rose discovered that a lot of her power was gone. The only thing that seemed to remain was her foresight. She was rather happy the reappearance of her old weaknesses, relieved that life was returning to normal.

It was a good time for the Winchesters. However, Gabriel was right and, before long, they starting itching for a hunt.

They found a newspaper article about a graveyard in Masonville, Georgia that was suddenly missing fifteen of its bodies. The three of them set out on a chilly morning, bags loaded carefully next to the weapons in the trunk.

Cas was not accompanying them. It had been decided during their vacation that, while his main priority would always be the Winchesters, the angel would take a few of the other Hunters under his wing (metaphorically speaking, Rose was quick to point out).

They bought him a cell phone (which Dean insisted was like watching a Hell's Angel ride a moped) and two new shirts and a pair of jeans (Rose was getting a little tired of the rumpled suit).

It was not until they got on the highway that things truly eased back into normal for them. They bickered over Dean's cassette tapes, lunch was two bags of Funyons and some beef jerky from and Exxon, Sam and Rose argued over leg room until Dean blasted "Houses of the Holy" at such a volume that they could no longer hear each other, and they stopped for the night at a motel with a cowboy theme and orange shag carpet.

They walked down to a bar and grill where Rose and Dean got a cheeseburger and Sam got a grilled chicken salad. They all three ordered beer.

They were half-way through their meal when Rose cleared her throat loudly and raised her bottle into the air. "Here's to things being better than before."

Sam grinned and held up his own bottle. "Here's to hoping that the Impala makes it another 800,000 miles." He earned a kick from his brother for that.

Rose and Sam looked at Dean expectantly. He picked at his label for a moment before, slowly, finishing the toast. "To the family business."

1,600 miles away, a mousy looking man named Chuck Shirley poured his own drink and booted up his computer. He opened a document titled Supernatural and began to type his final words:

_You probably think I'm crazy; a funny, little man sitting at his computer in his underwear and bathrobe with delusions of being a prophet. You don't believe in vampires, werewolves, ghosts, wendigos or anything else that goes bump in the night. Some of you don't believe in angels and demons. However, I want all of you to take at least one thing away from my story._

_There are people in this world; special, rare people, who can love more fiercely than most. These people will always fight the good fight no matter how many times they are knocked down or torn apart or sliced open, no matter the battle scars._

_I wish that I could say that the Winchesters live happily ever after, but I have not seen the ending yet. And that's okay. Because, it doesn't matter how much pain lies ahead, how much hardship. Sam, Dean, and Rose are the masters of their own fates, and they are not ready for their story to be over yet._

_They have work to do._


	23. Life is a Highway

AN: Goodbye

It was strange, the difference a few sheets could make. Stretch them over some furniture and an entire house was completely changed. Mary Ellen Winchester fingered the hole in the piece of yellow linen covering the bare wooden frame of her childhood and sighed. Those sheets were supposed to cover her parent's bed, her mom's bed.

She looked around at all the boxes of books, with title lists on the lids in her brother's neat penmanship, careful like he was in everything. She heard a thump in the living room and a sound which was definitely a muffled curse. She smiled and started toward it, pausing to look at her reflection in the mirror which had only just begun to gather dust.

Her mother and Uncle Dean's green eyes stared back at her. She kept her blonde hair in a pixie cut to make hunting easier.

Her older sister, Samantha Deanne, was her opposite in almost every way. Her hair, when it was not braided and stuck under one of grandpa Bobby's trucker caps, hung down almost to her waist and was jet black. At her full height, she stood five foot four, as opposed to Mary Ellen who had stood eye to eye with her Uncle Dean at six foot one when he was still alive. Dee's eyes, which were hazel and just slightly catlike, were usually calm and collected. Mary Ellen was rarely calm and collected-her family had called her the pistol and her sister the peacemaker. Although it was a fool who thought that Samantha Deanne Winchester was a pushover or easy prey.

When Mary Ellen entered the room, her older sister was glaring at the box of books sitting on the floor with a look which should have set the papers alight.

"You okay there, Dee?" Mary Ellen (and it was always Maryellen, one word) teased. "Do I need to get the holy water?"

Dee glared at her for a split second, then regained her usual smile. "I'm fine. Just…" She trailed off and Mary Ellen caught her looking at the photographs on the wall.

"We're doing the right thing," the blonde assured her, turning to look at the pictures herself.

"I just, should I make Mitch go to college?"

"He doesn't want to." Mary Ellen put her arms around Dee's shoulders and forced her to make eye contact. "When was the last time anyone besides Mom and Dad made him do anything?"

Dee smiled. "When was the first time?"

"True."

Together, the sisters turned back to the pictures. They were not great works of art, no studio portraits or fancy frames. Most were just 4x6s, taken with the disposable camera Rose had taken to carrying around after the final battle with Lucifer, and then taped to one large section of the peeling wallpaper.

Rose and Sam sitting on a cooler while Dean tinkered on one of Bobby's junk cars. Castiel with his arms wrapped around his wife while she made pancakes. Dean and Sam cleaning their guns. Bobby kissing Ellen on their wedding day.

After a few years, Rose and Castiel welcomed Samantha Deanne Winchester into the world, four years later followed by Mary Ellen, and four years after that came Robert Michael. Rose had not wanted her children to live on the road; she believed that children needed a place to call their own, some form of stability even if they came from a family of Hunters. Bobby and Ellen had gladly opened up their home for their adopted family (with Aunt Jo, Ellen's daughter, dropping by occasionally). Sam and Dean never married, but moved in permanently as well, becoming devoted uncles.

Of course, they were still Hunters, but only two or three would go out at a time, like a family of traveling salesmen…with stakes and silver bullets.

The pictures continued; Sam and Dee doing math at the kitchen table. Dean and Mary Ellen bent over the engine of the Impala while Dean explained the workings of every part (coincidentally, the Impala never had mechanical problems again, possibly due to Heavenly interference). Mitch, usually so serious, laughing as Rose picked him up and tickled his belly. Castiel sitting in the middle of the sitting room floor while his teenage children crowded round to hear true stories of monsters and heroes too old to be in any books. The whole Winchester clan and Bobby on the day he changed the name from _Singer Salvage and Towing _to _Singer and Winchester Auto Repair_.

Theirs was a happy childhood, if not normal. What usual families had photographs of all three children with their first sawed-off shotguns. There were memories of intense terror as they learned to hunt. But, the main thing they inherited from the previous generation was that intense love and duty to each other, that kept them safe because, while they had never been expressly taught to look out for each other, it would never have occurred to them to do anything else.

They were, after all, Winchesters.

Still, Heaven had not promised immortality. Bobby was the first to go, peacefully in his sleep. Ellen followed shortly after in the same way. Sam and Dean and Rose were not old, but a Hunter's life was tiring and dangerous, and they always died young. Miraculously, none of them died violent deaths; living long enough to see Dee graduate Stanford with a degree in literature, Mary Ellen get a mechanics license, and Mitch set the SAT record for his high school before passing away, also peacefully in their sleep, all within six months of each other. Maybe that was the result of having an angel in the family (although Cas had returned to Heaven the day after Rose).

When their mother died, Dee, Mary Ellen, and Jack decided to take up the Winchester mantle and hunt full time. Which is what had led them to their present condition—with a house full of climate controlled boxes and a state of the art security system made of wires and runes.

"It's not like we're leaving forever," Dee said, trying to smile.

"Yeah, we'll come back every once in a while," Mary Ellen agreed.

The girls heard a sigh from behind them and turned to see Mitch standing in the kitchen doorway. "You two are being ridiculous," he said evenly. His voice was calm and deep, the way it had been for years on the infrequent occasions he spoke.

"How so?" Dee asked. She was not insulted; she had learned a long time ago to listen to what Mitch had to say. He was six foot and slighter built than their father, with their mother's brown hair. However, his eyes were an electric blue and from a very young age had shown with a not-entirely human light. Mary Ellen and Dee never forgot that their father was an angel and their mother was a psychic, but neither of them had inherited any of that. Mitch, on the other hand, had a talent for knowing what he could not and for making strange things happen around him.

He walked over to the wall and started taking down the photos, slipping them into the back of their grandfather's journal, taping them to the pages added in their mother's messy scrawl. "You're acting like this house is sacred. It's just a house."

"How can you say that?" Mary Ellen demanded hotly. "We were raised here!"

Dee put her hand on her sister's shoulder. She was well used to stepping between her hot-headed sister and her cool brother.

"Yeah," Mitch said, carefully adding the last picture. "And they were raised in a car. I love the Impala, but it's still a car." He shut the book and fixed his sisters with an inscrutable look. "This is what they wanted us to care about, that they taught us." He tapped the journal, and it sounded oddly loud in the still house. "We're their legacy. This is just the place they lived." Before his sisters could process that, he tucked the book back into his black duffle and slung it easily over his shoulder. "Can we go? Before we waste any more daylight…" He was almost out the door when he added, "and it's going to rain later in Texas if we head that way. Just so you know."

Mary Ellen and Dee exchanged looks. "Kid has a point," the younger said, grabbing her bright orange suitcase from the couch.

"He usually does," the brunette agreed, picking up her own dark green duffle with a grunt.

"Have we told him how annoying that is?"

"You have, plenty of times."

"Yeah, well," Mary Ellen cast a fond smile at where the lanky youth leaned against the car. "Maybe one day he'll listen."

Dee made a noncommittal noise and opened the trunk. They slipped their bags in among the weapons, then the younger two slid into their respective seats. Even though she was younger, Mary Ellen's love of cars, and the Impala in particular, had earned her the driver's seat as soon as she was big enough to reach the peddles. Dee always rode shot-gun and it never mattered if she offered, Mitch was content with the backseat and his thoughts every time.

Samantha Deanne Winchester was no psychic, but when she looked across at their yard, taking in the junk cars and the peeling blue paint, she thought she saw her mother and her uncles standing on the porch, young and beautiful the way they were in the old pictures. They were a transparent image, but distinct enough to see detail. Dean shoved Sam's shoulder, threw his arm around his sister. Rose smiled and blew her eldest a kiss while Dean and Sam waved at their niece. A breeze blew by, lifting her curls and stroking a cheek, smelling of evergreens and snow.

"I promise we'll be careful," she said quietly, a tear trickling down her cheek. "I'll look after them."

The horn honked and startled her. "Are you comin' or what?" Mary Ellen yelled out the window. "This isn't a pleasure cruise, Dee. We've got places to go, monsters to kill."

"Yeah, yeah," Dee replied, slamming the trunk lid shut. She looked back at the porch as the breeze died down. It was empty. She smiled a little to herself. "We have work to do."

The End


End file.
